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Scandal-plagued former Archbishop José Antonio Eguren Anselmi met Pope Francis for a private meeting in Rome on Friday last week.
The Vatican bulletin about it did not disclose the reasons for the meeting.
Nor was it clear from the bulletin as to whether Anselmi had been summoned to the meeting or whether he himself had asked for it.
Ongoing allegations
In April, at the age of 67, Anselmi resigned as head of the Peruvian Archdiocese of Piura. Most Catholic prelates retire when they are 75.
As a member of the Sodalitium Christinae Vitae (SCV), Anselmi’s reputation is tied to ongoing allegations of SCV’s involvement in land trafficking and financial corruption as well as physical, psychological, spiritual and sexual abuse.
Although whistleblowers had attempted to make the allegations known as early as 2000, their concerns did not begin to emerge in the public arena until 2015.
That was when Peruvian journalists Paola Ugaz and former SCV member Pedro Salinas published the book Half Monks, Half Soldiers which details years of abuse by top SCV members.
Given the authority he has held in the region and within the SCV, Anselmi has been at the centre of many of the accusations. In particular, he has been accused of being an architect of various schemes to oust farmers in his archdiocese from their land.
Whistleblowers called and called
According to Crux, allegations of abuse against the SCV were first made in 2000 by former member José Enrique Escardó Steck.
Then in 2010 further allegations were made.
After news broke last week that SCV’s founder, Peruvian layman Luis Fernando Figari, had been expelled from the SCV community, Peruvian theologian Rocio Figueroa spoke to media.
Speaking to Crux, Figueroa said that in 2010 she had asked that Figari be removed from leadership. At that time she was a member of the SCV’s women’s branch, the Marian Community of Reconciliation (MCR).
Currently a professor of Systematic Theology at Catholic Theological College in Auckland, Figueroa was one of five original members of the MCR and at one point served as superior general of the community.
She also worked as head of the women’s section in the former Vatican Council for Laity before uncovering abuses inside the SCV.
Figueroa told Crux that she was railroaded and bullied into silence for trying to sound the alarm.
Sanctions
Seven years later in 2017, Figari was sanctioned by the Vatican after facing various allegations of sexual, physical, spiritual and psychological abuse against members of the group.
Last week he was expelled from the SCV after Pope Francis last year sent his top two investigators to inquire into ongoing allegations of misconduct, including financial corruption.
After Figari’s expulsion, the SCV issued a statement saying they welcomed the gesture as “an act of pastoral charity, justice and reconciliation” for the community and for victims, noting that they had asked the Vatican to expel Figari from the community in 2019.
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