ROME (ITALY)
Crux
September 21, 2018
By Inés San Martín
FORT WORTH, Texas – Four months after the Chilean bishops presented their resignations en mass due to a massive clerical sexual abuse crisis, Pope Francis has accepted two more on Friday, bringing the total to seven.
Though the Vatican gave no reason for the pontiff’s decision, both prelates replaced on Friday are accused of sexually abusing minors.
Both prelates are currently being investigated by civil prosecutors, as is Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, the Archbishop of Santiago, who continues in his role despite allegations that he covered up clerical sexual abuse.
Bishop Cristian Contreras of San Felipe is one of the two whose resignation Pope Francis accepted on Friday. He’s being investigated for cover-up, but also for allegedly abusing a minor in the bishop’s house decades ago. He’s already been investigated in 2013 by the Vatican, which sent two priests to look into alleged sexual abuses, but no sanctions were imposed.
Contreras will be temporarily replaced by the head of the ecclesial tribunal of Santiago, Jaime Ortiz de Lezcano, who will serve as apostolic administrator. He was the man tasked with investigating former priest Cristian Precht, who was removed from the priesthood last week by Pope Francis without the possibility of appealing the sentence.
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