Marko Rupnik is no longer Fr. Marko Rupnik SJ, which is the way he wants it. Well, he gets it. I don’t like it any more than you. Marko Rupnik is still—intolerably—Fr. Marko Rupnik, though without faculties—unless a bishop or other religious institute takes him. The disgraced celebrity muralist cum inveterate pervert and abuser of mostly religious sisters is radioactive these days, so I suppose it is unlikely, but stranger things have happened.
I was about to ask if maybe there’s a job open in APSA, but then I remembered Bishop Zanchetta and realized there doesn’t need to be a job open for him to get it.
The statement from the superior of the Jesuits’ international houses, Fr. Johan Verschueren SJ, is an astounding piece of work, too.
Among other things, it says the Jesuits regret that Rupnik had to be expelled for disobedience—never mind that he’d done pretty much as pleased him for years, even when under various more-or-less secret restrictions (that were very strictly interpreted and loosely enforced)—rather than prosecuted for serial sexual, psychological, and spiritual abuse of more than a dozen “very highly credible” victims over three decades.
Verschueren cited “various reasons” for the lack of prosecution, “including the current limits of the norms relating to similar situations,” which, “did not allow this.”
Well, “various reasons” is doing a lot of work there, because it’s pretty easy for the head man—that’s Pope Francis—to waive the statute of limitations for crimes of abuse and cover-up. But Francis is on the record as saying he just doesn’t like to do so in cases involving adults.
Pope Francis has been dining out on a paper revolution that made it easier to prosecute crimes of abuse and coverup, and trading on promises to take the abuse of adults seriously. However, he has been extremely reluctant to use the new laws. He may decide at last to step in and deal with Rupnik, but it will be an act of sheer power if he does, inevitably perpetuating the notion that his pontificate is one of special cases and personal rule.
The writing was on the wall way back in 2018, when Pope Francis extra-judicially defrocked two ancient Chilean bishops. He did so in lieu of any housecleaning of that sorely tried country’s episcopate, which he’d promised in the wake of l’Affaire Barros.
It was clear to any with eyes to see, even then, that Pope Francis could not begin to address the leadership crisis at its root by displays of raw power brought to bear on secluded perverts or tired old has-beens, but only by exercising transparency in governance and especially by letting justice be seen to be done.
“Very highly credible” is how the Jesuits themselves described the victims and their claims in June of this year, by the way. That’s important, not least because other Jesuits—Rupnik’s superiors in Rome and his native Slovenia—either ignored reports of his criminally perverse antics or else actively worked to discredit his accusers, starting in the ‘90s.
It was another Jesuit who said so, Bishop Daniele Libanori SJ, after he investigated the Loyola Community of women religious Rupnik had helped found in Slovenia before leaving the country and setting up shop in what came to be called the Centro Aletti, which began as a work of the Jesuits but became a public association of the faithful under the Rome diocese in 2019.
“I cannot help but greatly regret this insistent and stubborn inability to deal with the voice of so many people who have felt hurt, offended, and humiliated by his behavior and his way of acting and behaving towards them,” Verschueren said, but that’s not what got him booted, nor is Rupnik the only one who hurt, offended, and humiliated the victims.
“What has been said does not exclude the good he has done,” Verschueren also said, “and the spiritual fruit of which he has been the intermediary for many and for many others in the Church.” Never mind that Rupnik’s art was part of his sick modus operandi, built into his lurid schtick.
“We must remember what Jesus taught us,” Verschueren went on to say.
Verschueren wasn’t talking about Matthew 18:6 and millstones, or Luke 21:12-18, but Matthew 5:23-24 and the lines about being reconciled.
Pope Francis wants his legacy to be genuine reform, a real recovery of participation in pilgrimage, the practice of piety in all forms, a return to the fundamentals of Christian life. To judge by the way he has governed, however, Rupnik may deserve to be the poster boy of his pontificate.
There is still time for him to turn this thing around and make good on his promises, but the window of opportunity is closing, and he isn’t making it any easier on himself.
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Journalist Altieri is an honest broker and hopeful. This writer has some of that commitment, though not a journalist am committed to the prophetic witness [ecclesial prophecy is not exactly foretelling events, rather witness to Christ] of the priesthood.
Now Christ welcomed, intermingled with, broke bread with sinners. He came to call the spiritually sick, not the righteous. Pope Francis’ proposition, a Church open to all comers, a field hospital for the morally wounded has appeal. Was the Church through the centuries too restrictive in demanding conversion prior to entry and access to the sacraments? As Fr Spadaro said, ‘We deny them what they need’ [his 2+2=5 refers to theology, which is not casuistic math]. Somewhat parallel to an insular Church on the defensive in a hostile world. A world the Apostle said God would bring to the truth. Attractive. Augustine muses even the tares might be converted. Experience taught there are exceptions. D&R cases where one party disappears.
A warming new paradigm if it were not for premises in Amoris Laetitia, and follow up by Francis that undermines orthodoxy. From the contention that permanent moral principles do not exist, that conscience is supreme inclusive of Christ’s revelation, that mitigation necessarily gives the benefit of the doubt to the penitent living in manifest sin. All deceptively cloaked with a blanket of orthodoxy.
https://www.edmundmazza.com/2023/07/04/if-francis-is-pope/
Further assessment on whether relaxing ‘rules’ might prove beneficial, such as those living in ‘irregular’ lifestyles repenting and converting to the faith, we already have a similar situation. Many Catholics routinely receive the Eucharist but do not practice. Prime examples Biden, Pelosi. Pope Francis’ open Church policy of mercy rather than rules sidetracks Catholics from assuming the narrow road required for salvation.
There has to be at least willingness to reform to Christ’s commandments. Such a policy would most likely affirm those living in sin. The allegation by Francis that the Eucharist is not a ‘reward’ is misdirected. The Eucharist is indeed a remedy, a strengthening for those of us struggling to live the commandments. If in weighing these issues there’s doubt, the benefit certainly belongs to Christ’s revelation. Repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
Thank you Christopher.
I think it would be good if there was nothing more said about Fr. Rupnik and he was allowed to disappear completely into the twilight. Many institutions have poured enormous resources into his murals. We need to forget about Rupnik and learn to live with the murals. Much of the Mosaic tile work is pretty impressive.
Gerard that sounds like the discredited old policy of sweeping it all under the ecclesiastical carpet. His art is ghastly and should be ripped out as ruthlessly as much traditionally Catholic architecture was by the post conciliar clerical vandals. Or cover them up with drapes until they can be removed.By their fruits you shall know them.
Art should stand or fall on its own merits or lack thereof, not the artist’s moral failings. Plenty of great artists & composers had struggles with substance abuse, immorality, criminal behavior, etc.
I personally believe the world would be better minus Fr. Rupnik’s creations but not just on account of his behavior. And that goes for many compositions in our current hymnbooks.
I recall viewing his atrocity in the Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity back in 2007, sixteen years before I ever knew who he was. It was very much a post-conciliar moment of aesthetic trauma. Then his pedestrian tripe cropped up on the cover of the “missalettes” in my parish. Unbearable.
Then we found out who he is…neither an artist, a faithful Catholic or priest.
Yup. His artwork reminds me of anime cartoons.
🤣
Mrscracker, you crack me up!
I agree with you Colm. His art is ghastly. Better replace them with beautiful Catholic Christian art.
Alternatively:
Jail Rupnik…and “gift” his mosaics to the Jesuit network.
Learn to live with his murals? Impressive?
Blech! 🤢 No thanks, I’d rather see other artists works than this guy’s giant sized, praying mantis-like “art”.
This criminal requires laicization and excommunication. I would suggest incarceration but given his crimes live on in Europe it is unlikely he would face such a penalty. L’amour, l’amour, you know…
And scrape his derivative pedestrian nonsense off the walls of every church which they desecrate. This cat ain’t Caravaggio.
I am wondering. Are there plans to remove his paintings on the facade of the basilica in Lourdes?
The Rupnik sex abuse coverup appears consistent with the “theater-of-reform” produced directed and performed by the Pontiff Francis, when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aries, and head of the Bishops Conference of Argentina.
As a number of observers have noted (aming them, Damian Thompson of the Spectator), while serving as Archbishop of Buenos Aries, I believe in 2010, then-Cardinal Bergoglio asserted that during his tenure as archbishop, his diocese, the second-largest Catholic diocese in the world, after Paris, (approximately 2.7 million Catholics, and approximately 800 priests) had “no cases of sex abuse.” None. He mentioned that he did hear of this in other places, and he advised his colleagues to make a strong response, and remove an offending priest from ministry.
What a miraculous achievement by the former Archbishop of Buenos Aries, the leadership of one of the largest Catholic dioceses in the world, and despite the horrible cases emerging all around the Church, Buenos Aries was “immaculate.” (Cue applause track here…)
What then-Cardinal Bergoglio failed to mention was that some people in Argentina, including a sitting judge of the high court of Argentina, have raised objections to the then-Cardinal’s “behind-the-scenes” interference in the investigation and trial of Rev. Julio Grassi, now serving a 15-year sentence for sexual abuse of an orphan boy in Grassi’s orphanage, after his conviction by the same high court.
The judge et all report that Cardinal Bergoglio spent millions of church funds hiring a law firm to produce a book-length report attacking the motives and credibility of those accusing Grassi.
This recalls to mind the statements the Pontiff made in the Barros case in Chile earlier in his papacy when he blurted out that the faithful in Chile expressing convictions against Barros et al were just just “dumb.”
There are other similar cases registering his “preference-for-the-predator,” and his callous disregard for victims, such as the Msgr. Inzolli case in Italy, when in 2013, just 3 years after Benedict XVI found Inzolli guilty and “de-facultied” him for offenses uncovered by the CDF (including sex abuse of boys in the confessional), somehow, the Pontiff Francis saw fit to restore priestly faculties to Inzolli. After the families of the victims were ignored when expressing their outrage at the injustice done in “resurrecting” Inzolli, they went to civil court against Inzolli, and won a conviction against him, forcing Pontiff Francis to rescind his “liberation” of Inzolli.
Some of the complaints against the Pontiff in his behaviors in Argentina are touched on in an article at Bishop Accountability, which I will post immediately after this.
Perhaps these stories explain the video posted by Damian Thompson, showing the Pontiff confronted by a reporter from South America, while walking in Vatican City I believe, and denying he ran a campaign to protect Julio Grassi.
His ‘artwork’ is a vulgar joke on sexual probity.
His one eyed monster figure strikes a chord in the ribald. They know very well what the one eyed monster is and Rupnik has plastered it all over the Church. Somewhere old Scratch is having a bitter laugh.
Just a note that I did send a link showing the video of the reporter confronting the Pontiff Francis about his actions in the Julio Grassi case. It was from PJ Media, I believe in 2018?
Thank you Christopher for courageously reporting on the latest depressing Imbroglio.
It would be un miracolo for the Pope to reinstate the Rupnik excommunication that mysteriously disappeared. Rupnik was correct to tell his victims that no one would help them. It looks like the Jesuit leadership fell on their swords to cover the serious blunders above them and protect the Amoris agaenda of this pontificate. And why not? There credibility was shot anyway. Ma che pizza che sei!
MICHAEL O’BRIEN