Rome Newsroom, Oct 25, 2023 / 12:55 pm (CNA).
Father Marko Rupnik, the former Jesuit priest and mosaic artist accused of serious abuses against women, has been accepted for priestly ministry in a diocese in Slovenia, according to Italian and German media reports.
The news portal financed by the German Bishops’ Conference, Katholisch.de, reported Wednesday that the Diocese of Koper confirmed Rupnik had been incardinated in the diocese, meaning he is under the authority of the diocesan bishop.
CNA reached out to the diocese for confirmation and to clarify Rupnik’s exact role but did not receive a response prior to publication.
The Diocese of Koper covers the westernmost side of Slovenia and has over 266,000 inhabitants. Rupnik was born in the small Slovenian town of Zadlog, which is part of the Diocese of Koper.
The once-popular mosaic artist was dismissed from the Jesuits on June 9 for failing to obey the directions of his superiors, including restrictions on his ministry imposed at the recommendation of investigators.
In February, the Jesuits said they had opened a new internal procedure against Rupnik to investigate accusations against him spanning from 1985 to 2018. The “highly credible” accusations, they said, included claims of spiritual, psychological, and sexual abuse, and abuse of conscience.
Rupnik was also briefly excommunicated in 2019 for absolving in confession an accomplice in a sin against the Sixth Commandment.
Rupnik’s welcome into the Slovenian diocese stands in contrast to the sanctions imposed on the religious sister with whom he co-founded the Loyola Community of religious women in Slovenia where his abuses allegedly took place.
Sister Ivanka Hosta, the superior general of the Loyola Community since 1994, was quietly removed in June from the governance of the community and has been banned from contacting current or former sisters for three years and ordered to make monthly pilgrimages to pray for Rupnik’s victims.
She is reportedly staying in a monastery in Braga, in northern Portugal, following the conclusion of an investigation into her leadership of the religious community by the Diocese of Rome.
Hosta founded the community of women religious together with Rupnik in Ljubljana, Slovenia, in the early 1990s, though the two dramatically split ways in 1993.
According to a June 21 decree sent by Rome auxiliary bishop Daniele Libanori, SJ, to Hosta, and obtained by the news outlet Sete Margens, Hosta was prohibited from holding any position or function of government or from carrying out any spiritual direction in the community.
If you value the news and views Catholic World Report provides, please consider donating to support our efforts. Your contribution will help us continue to make CWR available to all readers worldwide for free, without a subscription. Thank you for your generosity!
Click here for more information on donating to CWR. Click here to sign up for our newsletter.
Justice Scalia shocked many when he made an observation that offended the prejudices of most Americans who can not deal with the possibility that they are unable to apply commonsense to a treasured belief. He insisted that in law there is no presumption of innocence as commonly assumed. Of course. The law does not presume anything, neither guilt nor innocence. Neither should we. But we are always obligated to be prudent. Given that Rupnik is a self-admitted degenerate, commonsense would preclude his fitness to function as an active priest.
Francis ignoring this reality is one of numerous reasons for him to step down.
Edward. Law, applied as a just arbiter cannot presume innocence or guilt until the person who is under the law is charged. A charge presumes some degree of guilt. The accused consequently is a defendant. Legal codices including the Roman required that the defendant be allowed a defense. Cicero argued for the presence of a defense attorney. Although it wasn’t until the Inquisition that the Dominicans, who were the sanctioned inquisitors, insisted that a defendant have an attorney to represent their defense.
Insofar as Rupnik it’s not clear whether he admitted guilt of sexual abuse followed by confession of the abused. There appears sufficient circumstantial evidence to convict him, based on the sisters’ testimonies.
Has he committed criminal acts that should be investigated by law enforcement?
Edward. Law, applied as a just arbiter cannot presume innocence or guilt until the person who is under the law is charged. A charge presumes some degree of guilt. The charged consequently is a defendant. Legal codices including the Roman required that the defendant be allowed a defense. Cicero argued for the presence of a defense attorney. Although it wasn’t until the Inquisition that the Dominicans, who were the sanctioned inquisitors insisted that a defendant have an attorney to represent their defense.
Insofar as Rupnik, it’s not clear whether he admitted guilt of sexual abuse followed by sacramental confession of the abused. Just scanned Altieri’s article who claims a “mountain of evidence”, although no citing of his confession of guilt. There nonetheless appears sufficient circumstantial evidence to convict him, based on the sisters’ testimonies. Added to that, their are priests who have been convicted of sexual abuse and incarcerated on unreliable allegations.
Read the commentary recommended by Carl Olson, which provides strong circumstantial evidence since it cites three locales from which Sisters had claimed abuse, Ljubljana, Slovenia, Rome at the Centro Aletti, and Gorizia, Italy. The charge of hearing the confession of a woman following sexual activity with her, allegedly occurred at the Centro Aletti Rome. What apparently sealed his conviction was his unwillingness to respond to a Jesuit investigation team.
It may be said silence doesn’t necessarily admit guilt. Christ is said to have remained silent when accused. However, when Caiaphas asked directly if he was the son of God, Jesus answered in the affirmative in witness to himself.
It appears Fr Rupnik hasn’t directly admitted guilt, if it can be justifiably differentiated from acknowledgement. “Fr Sosa [Jesuit Superior General] said that Fr Rupnik acknowledged the crime and repented, and so the excommunication was lifted. Given that the penalty was declared by the CDF to have been automatically incurred, which action is akin to a non-automatic penalty being imposed by the CDF, it is probably the case that Fr Rupnik did not admit guilt for the crime, thus ‘purging the contempt’, which means abandoning his contumacious and stubborn refusal to make such an admission” (Fr Gerald Murray in Diane Montagna interview, Catholic Herald Dec 2022). It’s complex. Acknowledgment of a crime means it was understood by Rupnik to have been committed. Silence may signify guilt if there’s no denial. In contrast Christ in response to Caiaphas declared the truth of the allegation.
I totally agree by what the headline screams. Compare that with Donald Trump. I see him as innocent of all the charges brought against him in various courts until proven guilty in these courts.
You might want to read this exhaustive piece published by America Magazine in June 2023…
What the Bishop protecting Rupnik meant to say is this: “Rupnik is assumed innocent until be proven guilty a second time.”
That’s just being “open to the spirit.”
And now that their esteemed sex abuser friend and macabre-artist Rupnik is safe from a second guilty verdict, Cardinal O’Malley (who “mis-spoke” when he last messaged us this year, by “incorrectly” and pre-emptively asserting that the leading priest of the papal sex abuse committee was resigning because he was too busy with other stuff, resulting in the public contradiction…within 24 hours…by the same priest who had to tell the truth that the committee was a farce…as did Marie Collins a few short years before), has deemed it a fitting time to finally “reach out” to the women religious victims that Rupnik is “presumed innocent” of abusing.
Apparently, to this group above, this all makes sense to them, in their own internal logic: like worshipping Pachamama and then saying you didn’t.
Because for the sake of “the movement,” we are all asked…to pretend for the hierarchy…that reality isn’t happening.