Ex-nuncio to France to face trial in Paris on sexual assault charges

July 23, 2020 CNA Daily News News Briefs 0 Print

Rome Newsroom, Jul 23, 2020 / 08:00 am (CNA).- A retired Vatican diplomat accused of sexual assault while in office is due to appear before the Paris criminal court in November.

Archbishop Luigi Ventura resigned as nuncio to France in December 2019 at the age of 75. He had served in the post 10 years.

Ventura was accused of inappropriately touching a young male staffer of Paris City Hall in January 2019.

It was confirmed to CNA July 23 by Vincent Plumas, deputy prosecutor and press manager of the office of the public prosecutor of Paris, that Ventura “should appear before the Paris Criminal Court for acts of sexual assault on November 10.”

The Vatican revoked Ventura’s diplomatic immunity in July 2019, paving the way for a trial in French courts.

Ventura has been living in Rome since September last year, according to French news agency I. Media.

He was first accused in early 2019 of inappropriately touching a staffer at a Jan. 17, 2019, reception for the New Year address of Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo. The accusation was then investigated by Parisian authorities for several months.

After the initial allegation was made against Ventura, he faced a second accusation of sexual misconduct against an adult male relating to his time in Canada in 2008. He has denied the allegations.

Ventura was apostolic nuncio to Canada from 2001 to 2009.

Christian Vachon, who was 32 at the time of the alleged incident, claims Ventura touched his buttocks at least twice during a banquet held at the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, near Quebec.

Ventura was ordained a priest of the Diocese of Brescia in 1969. He entered the diplomatic service of the Holy See in 1978 and was stationed in Brazil, Bolivia, and the UK. From 1984 to 1995 he was appointed to serve at the Secretariat of State in the Section for Relations with States.

After his episcopal consecration in 1995, Ventura served as nuncio to Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chile, and Canada. He was appointed apostolic nuncio to France in September 2009.

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On All Souls’ Day, Pope Francis prays for an end to war

November 2, 2017 CNA Daily News 2

Albano Laziale, Italy, Nov 2, 2017 / 09:52 am (CNA/EWTN News).- We should beg God to put an end to the violence and destruction wrought by war, especially as the world seems to prepare for another conflict, Pope Francis said on All Souls’ Day.

Today “the world is at war again and is preparing itself to go more heavily into war. No more, Lord! No more! With war, you lose everything!” the Pope said Nov. 2.

“This is what we should say today; that we pray for all the dead, but in this place we pray in a special way for these young people (killed in war).”

Pope Francis said gave a short homily at Mass for All Souls’ Day at the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery and Memorial in Nettuno, an Italian cemetery for American personnel killed in World War II.

Located a little more than 20 miles south of Albano Laziale and dedicated in 1956, the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery covers 77 acres. There are 7,860 servicemen buried there and in a chapel on the grounds are the names of 3,095 servicemen who went missing in action.

Most of those who are buried in the Nettuno cemetery died in the liberation of Sicily, the landings at Salerno and Anzio, and in air and naval support of these operations in 1943 and 1944.

In recent tradition, popes have said an All Souls’ Day Mass at Rome’s Campo Verano cemetery, founded in the 19th century. Pope Francis did the same for the first three years of his pontificate, though in 2016 he chose to say the All Souls’ Day Mass at Rome’s Prima Porta Cemetery instead.

All those present at the cemetery today are “gathered together in hope,” he said. But often this hope has its roots in human suffering, such as the suffering of war.

But it is “better to hope without this destruction,” he pointed out and without the death of “thousands upon thousands” of young people.

Therefore, he said, “if today is a day of hope, today is also a day of tears.” Tears just like those cried by the women who mourn the death of a husband or a child who has died in service to their homeland. “It’s tears that humanity today must not forget,” he emphasized.

The Pope explained that pride is the vice which leads people to seek solutions to problems through a declaration of war, and that humanity “has not learned the lesson” nor does it seem to “want to learn it.”

Francis concluded by reminding that today is a day to pray for all the dead, but that we should pray especially for those young people killed in war and buried in the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery.

“We also pray,” he continued, “for the dead of today, the dead of war, even innocent children. This is the fruit of war: death.”

 

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