The scandal of sexual abuse that divided the American Catholic Church

VATICAN CITY (AP) – Two weeks after the crisis of Pope Francis, accused of concealing the sexual misconduct of former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, Francis refused to answer, his accuser changed his story and many new characters entered the fray.

Ordinary cardinals, bishops, priests and faithful ask for answers, since the Vatican has known since at least 2000 about McCarrick's allegations about seminarians.

Francis is increasingly under pressure to respond to the claims of Bishop Carlo Maria Vigano, who rehabilitated following the sanctions imposed by Pope Benedict XVI.

Here is a glimpse of the scandal that divided the American Catholic hierarchy and further tarnished Francis' record of abuse.

Vigano said in his August 26 statement that Benedict XVI imposed "canonical sanctions" on McCarrick in 2009 or 2010, similar to those imposed by Francis this summer after McCarrick was accused of seeking a minor.

"The cardinal had to leave the seminary where he lived, he was forbidden to celebrate mass in public, to participate in public meetings, to give lectures, to travel, with the obligation to devote himself to a life of prayer and penance "Vigano wrote.

Vigano stated that he told Francis on June 23, 2013 that McCarrick had "corrupted a generation of seminarians and priests" and that Benedict "ordered him to retire in a life of prayer and penance".

But he said that Francis had effectively rehabilitated McCarrick and appointed him a trusted advisor while he was looking to redo the leadership of the American church to focus less on cultural wars.

The public record, however, is full of evidence that McCarrick lived a life without any punishment from 2009, traveling a lot for the church, attending official duties, including at the Vatican alongside Benedict and Vigano. duty to honor him at a ceremony in New York.

Faced with such evidence, Vigano changed his story to say that while Benedict's measures were in place, McCarrick had not "obeyed" them and Vigano was unable to enforce them.

Vigano told LifeSiteNews, an ultra-conservative website, that Benedict had made the sanctions "private" probably because McCarrick was retired and Benoît, trying to avoid the scandal, thought he was obeying.

Even the conservative National Catholic Register, which originally published Vigano's revelation, acknowledged that the severity of the measures reported by Vigano is now an open question.

Quoting Benedict's relative, the Register said that Benedict did not remember how he handled the case, but that there was no official decree against McCarrick, "just a private request" to keep a low profile.

If this is true, it would run counter to Vigano's accusation that Francis would rehabilitate McCarrick with canonical sanctions.

A few hours after the revelation of Vigano's accusations, Francis said at a press conference: "I will not say anything about it." He challenged reporters to investigate Vigano's claims and has said: maybe I'll talk.

That said, Francis has indirectly mentioned the scandal several times since. He said that "silence and prayer" are often the best answer to people in search of scandal. He declared that he was not a Christian to accuse others, but to accuse himself of recognizing sin. And he told the newly ordained bishops to work in communion – not like solitary actors wanting to settle their personal accounts.

The Vatican press service refused any comment, refusing to say what possible sanctions had been imposed on McCarrick and what measures, if any, Francis had taken against them.

When Francis and Vigano met in June 2013, Francis spent three months in a new job where he knew that he was going to make enemies with the type of conservative culture warriors that Vigano was defending.

A month after the clash over McCarrick's sexual past, Francis won praise from the liberal Catholic world for telling another so-called gay priest he had named a close adviser: "Who am I to judge?
This suggests that Francis, at least in 2013, did not consider that past sexual relations or homosexual orientation of his counsel constituted a felony offense – or that these relationships could constitute an abuse of power.

But Francis acknowledged that something was wrong when he sent the Vatican's biggest expert on sexual abuse to investigate Scottish cardinal Keith O'Brien, who recused himself of the conclave that elected the pope because of allegations that he had slept with seminarians.

O'Brien was a tough conservative of homosexuality whose sexual peccadillos were publicly broadcast, which could explain the disparity of treatment.

More than a week before the revelation of Vigano, the head of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, announced that he wanted an audience with Francis to present his request for a Vatican inquiry into McCarrick case.

At the time, DiNardo's call was considered a power game by American bishops, who were under fire for covering McCarrick for decades, to blame the Vatican. McCarrick was appointed Archbishop of Washington and Cardinal in 2001 by Pope John Paul II, although he knows at the Vatican that he slept with seminarians.

DiNardo responded to his Vatican inquiry with a statement that Vigano's accusations deserve answers. More than a dozen American bishops echoed the call, although others, including a senior Francis official, Cardinal Blase Cupich, protested. Cupich said Francis should not go into the "rabbit hole" by answering.

No date for a DiNardo hearing has been set. But he must travel to Rome on September 27 to preside over a deacon ordination ceremony for the seminarians of North American College, the American seminary just up the Vatican hill.

Meanwhile, Francis met with Washington Cardinal Donald Wuerl, who faces calls to resign both the McCarrick scandal and the mismanagement of some abusive cases when he was bishop at Pittsburgh. These cases have been exposed in a recent Pennsylvania grand jury report.

Another blow to Wuerl's ability to lead, one of his own deacons said in a letter published Sunday that he could not conscientiously anymore attend the Mass and called him to resign.

Wuerl actually offered to resign two years ago when he turned 75, so the decision to leave was Francis's alone.

In the official silence of the Vatican, new actors appeared to try to discredit the Vigano version of events and defend Francis.

One of them is a familiar face, Reverend Federico Lombardi, the Jesuit who served as Vatican spokesman for Benedict and Francis until 2016. Last weekend, in a Communication crisis for the Vatican, it was announced that Lombardi would join the Jesuit magazine La Civilta Cattolica, which serves as unofficial spokesman to the papacy.

Last weekend, Lombardi and his English-speaking assistant, Reverend Thomas Rosica, issued a joint statement contesting Vigano's version of the controversial meeting that Vignao had orchestrated between Kim Davis and Francis Davis. visit to the USA

The meeting made headlines because it was considered a papal endorsement of Davis' highly politicized campaign – something Francis had avoided.

Vigano claimed that Francis had only praise for his management of the visit. But Lombardi and Rosica issued a statement, based on Rosica's handwritten notes from the time, recalling that Vigano himself had reported that Francis had scolded him for "cheating" on Davis and omitting to have married her four times.