Vatican defends secrecy in sensitive abuse case involving ex-Jesuit artist Marko Rupnik

ROME (AP) — The Vatican on Wednesday confirmed that a church trial against a famous ex-Jesuit priest accused of spiritual and sexual abuse of women is ongoing and defended the   secrecy of the proceedings   as necessary to guarantee the process.

An Italian blog reported Monday that an acquittal verdict had been reached in the case against the Rev. Marko Ivan Rupnik, a Slovenian artist whose mosaic designs decorate Vatican chapels and churches and basilicas around the world.

A statement from the Vatican press office said the report was “totally unfounded” and that judges were continuing to “examine documentation provided by the dioceses involved, the Jesuits, the parties concerned, and from the press.”

A scandal that calls into question Pope Francis The Rupnik scandal exploded publicly in late 2022, when Italian blogs first reported claims by women and nuns of sexual, spiritual and psychological abuse by Rupnik dating back to the 1990s that had been consistently dismissed by the Catholic hierarchy.

The Vatican has long considered any sexual relations between a priest and an adult as   sinful but consensual,   and only criminalizes the behavior if the adult “habitually…