The Court, chaired by the Bishop of Teruel and Albarracín, José Antonio Satué, delegate of the Holy See for this canonical procedure, has ordered the expulsion of Opus Dei de José María Martínez, the exprofesor of the Gaztelueta Educational Center (Leioa, Vizcay facts. Specifically, after a long ‘criminal administrative process’, which began in August 2022, Satué has concluded that «The proven facts, committed against a minor and attributable to the defendantthey constitute a serious cause that justifies the expulsion of the prelature, according to art. 30.1 of the Code of Private Law of Opus Dei », to which the exprofesor is linked as a numerary.
The case had already been civilly tried and the accused was sentenced, in the first instance, to eleven years in prison by the Provincial Court of Vizcaya on November 13, 2018. However, however, After resorting to the sentence, the Supreme Court reduced the penalty to two years in prisondated September 21, 2020. A sentence that is firm. A few years before, in 2015, an intracelesial investigation had been carried out, ordered from the doctrine of the faith, which determined that the facts denounced “have not been tested and, consequently, the good name and fame of the accused must be restored.” In this last issue the decree that has been known this Monday does not enter.
The case was reopened canonically due to the victim’s participation in the movie ‘Amen’, directed by Jordi Évole and produced by Disney. Juan Cuatrecasas was one of the ten young people who interviewed with the Pope, to whom he told his case. Before the young man’s complaints, Francisco attributed responsibility to “Church groups that are corrupt, such as those who tortured this boy” and promised to reopen the case, which took place on August 17, 2022. A decision that has not been exempt from controversybecause the defendant is a numerary and, therefore, lay, and the Code of Canon Law in force when he committed the crime only contemplated the priests for this crime, so the Pope had to authorize that it would be applied retroactively.
The resolution has not content any of the parties. On the one hand, Juan Cuatrecasas, the victim’s father, expressed yesterday to ABC the “disappointment of the whole family” for this decision and described the ruling as “vomitive, reprehensible and condemnable.” «That after all this is concluded with a request from the Vatican to Opus Dei to be expelled. It makes no sense. Like any institution, if you have a rotten apple, you should have expelled you before”.
On the other hand, the defendant published an entry into his Blog in which “once again I reiterate my innocence” and argued that “the sentence was seen coming before the start of the process.” In addition, he recalls that he has filed a demand for violation of the right to honor against Satué in civil justice, which has been admitted and for which, just this Monday, the bishop should have appeared before the judge in Pamplona. In addition, he also announces that he has written “a letter to the prelate of Opus Dei in which I request my departure from the work. I prefer to leave before being a problem, ”he concludes.
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