Pope Francis has ordinary the resignation of a distinguished US cardinal accused of sexually assaulting an adolescent nearly 50 years in the past.
Theodore McCarrick, 88, a former Archbishop of Washington, has also been suspended from public duties pending a canonical trial, the Vatican stated.
Last month US church officers stated the allegations have been credible. Mr McCarrick has said he has “completely no recollection” of the alleged abuse.
Further allegations have on the grounds that emerged.
Mr McCarrick used to be one in all essentially the most distinguished US cardinals and is one among essentially the most high-profile Catholic leaders to face abuse claims.
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“Pope Francis accepted his resignation from the cardinalate and has ordered his suspension from the exercise of any public ministry, along side the duty to stay in a house but to be indicated to him, for a lifetime of prayer and penance till the accusations made against him are tested in a normal canonical trial,” a Vatican commentary mentioned.
Mr McCarrick is said to have assaulted the teenager even as running as a clergyman in Big Apple in the early seventies. The claims were made public in June by way of the current Archbishop of The Big Apple, Cardinal Timothy Dolan.
He stated an unbiased forensic company had investigated the allegations. A review board, together with legal experts, psychologists, oldsters and a priest, then discovered the allegations “credible and substantiated”.
Several more men have when you consider that stated Mr McCarrick forced them to have intercourse with him at a beach area in New Jersey, at the same time as they studied for the priesthood as grownup seminarians. One guy has come forward announcing he was assaulted even as still a minor.
Mr McCarrick has now not commented at the more moderen allegations.
It has also because emerged that settlements were reached in at least two circumstances of alleged sexual misconduct with adults related to Mr McCarrick.
They involved “allegations of sexual misconduct with adults many years in the past”, while Mr McCarrick was operating as a bishop in New Jersey, bishops in the state told US media.
Mr McCarrick was a priest in 1958 and later labored in Ny prior to changing into Archbishop of Washington between 2001 and 2006.
Despite having officially retired, he has persevered to attend occasions in a foreign country, including the ones focusing on human rights issues.