The rehabilitation of the scandalized Legion of Christ has entered a
new phase according to the Vatican official in charge of the troubled
religious congregation.
In an Oct. 19 letter to Legion members, Archbishop Velasio De Paolis
said the Legion is entering a period of “reconstruction and renewal.”
His letter was dated one day before Pope Benedict XVI announced that
Archbishop De Paolis, president of the Vatican’s Prefecture for the
Economic Affairs, would be one of 24 new cardinals to be installed in a
consistory to be held Nov. 20.
The cardinal-designate had been tapped by the Pope in July to oversee
renewal of the Legion following revelations of grave sexual and
financial abuses by its charismatic founder, Father Marcial Maciel.
A team of five bishops assigned by the Pope to investigate, found
evidence of "very grave and objectively immoral actions" and said Father
Maciel had lived "a life devoid of scruples and authentic religious
meaning."
Because of his continuing influence on the congregation, the Vatican
team suggested that Legion redefine its mission and its governing
structure. Archbishop De Paolis has been charged with overseeing this
transition.
Questions remain, he acknowledged, about how much other Legion
leaders knew about Father Maciel’s abuses. Finding the truth is “not
that simple,” he said.
“There is one recurring difficulty from more than one place: some
feel that the current superiors could not have been ignorant of the
founder’s misdeeds,” he said.
“By silencing them, they must have lied.
But we know that the problem is not that simple. The different
denunciations published in the newspapers from the 1990s onward were
well known, also to the superiors of the congregation. But it is
something else to have proof that they were founded and even more that
they were certain. This came only much later, and gradually.”
The cardinal-designate said that today, “it is a vital requirement now to recover trust.”
Archbishop De Paolis said in his letter that while “not a few things”
must be changed, the Legion’s basic approach to religious life and the
priesthood should be “preserved and promoted."
"What matters above all is for each one to be moved by the desire for
the good, and by the will to be converted ever more to the Lord, under
the guidance of the Church, and so to be open to his will and to
progress along the path of fidelity and holiness according to our own
vocation," he said.
"If we are united and respectful of each other as we move forward the
journey will be swift and sure, but it will be certain shipwreck to let
ourselves get caught up in the desire to win out and impose our own
ideas."
The cardinal-designate outlined plans for a renewal process that
could take three years or more. He and four close advisors will work
with Legion officials to revise the congregation’s constitution; in
addition, he is considering appointing a committee to address complaints
made against the Legion and another to address financial management
issues in the congregation.
Included in the process will be a second investigation -- this time
of the lay branch of the congregation, known as Regnum Christi.
Archbishop Ricardo Blazquez of Valladolid, Spain, will head up that
investigation, working in tandem with cardinal-designate De Paolis.
Despite the shock caused by Father Maciel's actions, he said, the
Legion "not only survives, but is almost intact in its vitality."
SIC: CNA/INT'L