Guam court dismisses Vatican from lawsuit filed by Archbishop Apuron’s victims
February 24, 2023
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CWN Editor's Note: Archbishop Anthony Apuron, OFM Cap, governed the Church in Guam from 1985 until his removal from office in 2019. A man who alleges that the prelate sodomized him when he was 14 sued the Vatican as well as local Catholic entities; a judge declared that the Holy See enjoys foreign sovereign immunity.
In August 2018, Pope Francis said he would personally decide Archbishop Apuron’s appeal after the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith found him guilty of sexually abusing minors. “I am waiting for the report and then I will pass judgement,” Pope Francis emphasized.
In 2019, the Congregation announced the judgment. Even though Archbishop Apuron was found guilty of multiple “delicts against the Sixth Commandment with minors,” a relatively light sentence was imposed: “the privation of office; the perpetual prohibition from dwelling, even temporarily, in the jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Agaña; and the perpetual prohibition from using the insignia attached to the rank of Bishop.”
In other words, Archbishop Apuron, despite multiple acts of sexual abuse of minors, was not consigned to a life of prayer and penance—and he is permitted to celebrate Mass outside of Guam, as long as he does not wear the distinctive insignia of a bishop.
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