The Holy See has ordered two retired Slovenian bishops to withdraw from public life — one of them because he is believed to have fathered two children.
Monsignor Alojz Uran, who served as Archbishop of Ljubljana and Primate of Solvenia from 2004 until 2009, has been ordered to move to the northern Italian city of Trieste.
“This is a temporary measure to calm public opinion until the question is resolved,” stated Andrej Saje, spokesman for Slovenia’s bishops, on Ljubljana’s public television.
“The problem is his alleged paternity, which the former archbishop has always denied, but I think there have been some misunderstandings between him and the Holy See. Once these are cleared up, Uran will be able to return to his country,” Saje added.
Monsignor Uran — who resigned unexpectedly as archbishop in 2009 due to heart problems — does not acknowledge that he fathered two children, now adults. According to a report in the daily newspaper Vecer, he is said to have refused a DNA test and “Rome continues to suspect he did not tell the truth”.
Saje denied that Monsignor Uran is being disciplined for a financial scandal, involving high-risk investments and even churches being mortgaged, that brought the diocese of Maribor to the brink of bankruptcy two years ago.
The other former bishop who has been censured is Monsignor Franc Kramberger, former Archbishop of Maribor, who retired in February 2011 in the wake of the financial debacle.
According to the daily newspaper Delo, he has been deemed to have “objective responsibility” for the scandal, which reportedly cost the archdiocese 800 million euros ($NZ1,215 million).
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Image: Finance.si