ROMA.- The Knights of Columbus, an influential charitable organization catlicaannounced that they will cover their mosaics made by a famous artist Former Jesuit accused of abusing women.
“The world’s largest Catholic fraternal group said the organization would for now place cloth over mosaics at its Washington shrine and a chapel at its headquarters in New Haven, Connecticut. A permanent plaster covering may be in order, depending on the outcome of the Vatican’s investigation into the Rev. Marko Rupnik,” the group said in a statement.
Abuses allegedly committed by the artist
Rupnik, whose mosaics adorn some of the most important and visited Catholic shrines in the world, has been accused by more than 20 women of psychological, spiritual and sexual abuse over decades.
The scandal over their alleged abuse has continued to grow and has implicated Pope Francis, as the Vatican and his Jesuit order long ignored the women’s complaints until their stories were published in late 2022 in blogs and Italian newspapers.
The group’s decision to cover its mosaics marks the first announcement by a major church, organization or diocese that it has heeded victims’ requests to cover or remove publicly accessible works.
Rupnik, a charismatic preacher, co-founded a Jesuit-inspired community in his native Slovenia and later opened a workshop in Rome that received commissions to install mosaics in some of the Catholic Church’s most important shrines in Lourdes, France; Fatima, Portugal; and even the Vatican’s own Apostolic Palace.
The scandal over his alleged abuse raised the question of what to do with the mosaics, because some of his victims say they were a traumatic reminder of what they had suffered. For others, they became a symbol of the Church’s continuing indifference to adult abuse victims.
Laura Sgro, a Rome-based lawyer representing five women who say they were abused by Rupnik, welcomed the Knights’ decision. “We are grateful for this decision, for this act of great respect for the victims,” she told The Associated Press.
FUENTE: AP