A Vatican spokesman has said he never intended to sue a Canadian blogger who received a lawyer’s letter threatening possible legal action.
Fr Thomas Rosica, CSB, who works as an English language assistant to the Holy See Press office, issued a statement that “it was never my intention to sue” blogger David Domet.
Mr Domet had written statements on his Vox Cantoris blog that Fr Rosica said were false and slanderous.
The blog statements concerned Fr Rosica and Catholic doctrine regarding marriage and the family.
The blogger received a letter in February from a lawyer representing Fr Rosica, who is the chief executive of the Canadian Salt and Light Catholic Media Foundation and Television Network.
The letter stated the claims posted on the blog were “libelous” and “actionable in law”.
The lawyer’s letter instructed Mr Domet to remove all references to Fr Rosica from the blog and post an apology, or “we will seek instructions to commence an action against you”.
On his Salt and Light blog, Fr Rosica wrote that he had been strongly advised to respond, “as an individual and in no institutional capacity to the Vatican or to my place of work, to the continuous false, slanderous statements of a blogger over a long period of time that resulted in gross distortion, misinformation, many phone calls, letters and clear threats from callers based on the repeated false information contained in the blog”.
But he explained that it “was never my intention to sue, but rather to issue a letter to ‘cease and desist’ the frivolous calumny”.
“A legal firm, offering its service pro bono to us, issued a letter to cease and desist. No lawsuit was ever launched against the blogger! The matter is now closed.”
Fr Rosica wrote that he fully supports the teaching of the Church.
News that Mr Domet had been threatened with legal action led to an outpouring of criticism of Fr Rosica and support for the embattled blogger.
Sources