Pope Francis has sent two members of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith to Peru to investigate what is known as the 'Sodalitium Case'. Several leaders of this lay movement, called Sodalitium of Christian Life, are being investigated for allegedly abusing 36 people between 1975 and 2002.
Two journalists brought the case to light in 2015. And in 2018, the Vatican announced it would intervene in the group, just one month after Peru's Public Prosecutor's Office requested the preventive imprisonment of several members, including the founder, Luis Fernando Figari, who was expelled from the movement.
The papal commissioners for this investigation are the Archbishop of Malta, Charles Scicluna, and the Spanish priest Jordi Bertomeu. The audit will take place at the Apostolic Nunciature in Lima.
Both have already met with the president of the Peruvian Bishops' Conference, who expressed in a communiqué his support for an investigation.
One of the investigations led jointly by the Archbishop of Malta and the Spanish priest was the case of sexual abuse within the Church in Chile in 2018. It ended with the resignation of all Chilean bishops and the archbishop of Santiago.
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TR: KG
