A new pedophilia scandal breaks out in Pope Francis’ favorite Vatican basilica

A new scandal of “ordinary pedophilia” shakes the Vatican and evokes, twenty years later, the stories of sexual abuse of minors by prelates in the archdiocese of Boston, in the United States, which triggered the beginning of the wave that began at the beginning of the new century… This time in the center The Pontifical Basilica of Santa Maria Maggioreof which Pope Francis is particularly devoted.

The protagonist is the 74-year-old American Monsignor John Abruzzese, a canon of the Basilica, who was expelled from office and by the Vatican City with a final order, accusing him but without a regular process of coexistence “non sancta” in his lodgings with a young Italian who has just come of age, who is identified as “Roberto”, which is not his real name.

This is the real victim of at least a decade of sexual abuse by a priest in Sicily. After this childhood and adolescent experience, “Roberto” appeared recommended in the Basilica and went to live in his lodgings with the Abruzzese canon.

The story, full of details, was denounced by the Roman morning newspaper Domains in an investigation by Federica Tourn. Evidence that despite loud cries and promises of a systematic prosecution of the perpetrators, the Church continues to favor the avoidance of scandal in delicate cases rather than dealing with the victims of violent priests.

A bomb in the heart of the Vatican

The case is doubly scandalous because it is known that it did not end with a trial and it explodes inside the Vatican, where controls should be stricter. The four papal basilicas are in Rome and are extraterritorial, sovereignty corresponds to the State of the Vatican City. It is governed by its rules and not by those of the Italian legal system.

Santa María la Mayor is located in the central Esquiline neighborhood, next to the building that houses the Argentine embassy to the Italian government.

Canon John Anthony Abruzzese, originally from the state of Massachusetts in the United States, and who served as a priest in the archdiocese of Boston, was summoned in mid-February by the Extraordinary Commissioner of the Basilica, Monsignor Rolandas Makrickas.

The archpriest of the basilica, Cardinal Stanislaw Rilke and archbishop Piero Marini were also waiting for him. A reception committee that disturbed the rectory.

Abruzzese received a letter dated February 7 signed by the substitute of the Secretariat of State of the Holy See, Venezuelan Monsignor Edgar Peña Parra, in which it was announced that he had been fired and had to return to his diocese of Boston.

There was no explanation but everyone knew what it was. The canon was accused, but without trial, of sharing his lodgings with a twenty-year-old Italian youth who had suffered nine years of sexual abuse in Sicily by a priest whose name has never been published.

The expulsion of the canon from the papal basilica was justified by the high prelate of the Secretariat of State, one of the Pope’s main advisers, in article 11 of the statute of Santa María la Mayor.

There it is prescribed that, after three warnings, religious who “lead a lifestyle that does not correspond to the dignity and discipline of the chapter” are to be removed from the basilica.

The letter recalls that “after the repeated and neglected statements” of the archpriest of the basilica “in the presence of witnesses” the substitute is forced to remove Monsignor Abruzzese.

Expulsion

The letter announces to the punished monsignor that the archbishop of Boston, the influential Cardinal Patrick O’Malley, “has been warned.”

On February 21, Giovanni Abruzzese appealed to the Pope against the decision and defended his innocence. First, he explained to Francisco that he never received the “repeated and careless complaints” much less “in the presence of witnesses”.