An Argentine judge on Friday ruled that 20 cloistered nuns had suffered abuse for greater than twenty years by the hands of high-ranking clergy within the country’s conservative north, and ordered the accused archbishop and church officials to undergo psychological treatment and training in gender discrimination.
The ruling within the homeland of Pope Francis solid a highlight on the long-standing of abuse of nuns by priests and bishops within the Catholic Church.
Though long overshadowed by other church scandals, such abuses in religious life are increasingly being aired and denounced because of this of nuns feeling emboldened by the #MeToo movement, which has a corollary within the church, #NunsToo.
“I conclude and affirm that the nuns have suffered acts of gender violence religiously, physically, psychologically and economically for greater than 20 years,” Judge Carolina Cáceres said within the ruling from Salta in northwestern Argentina.
She also ordered the decision be conveyed to Francis.
The 4 accused clergy members have denied committing any violence. The archbishop’s lawyer, Eduardo Romani, dismissed Friday’s ruling as baseless and vowed to appeal. Still, he said, the archbishop would abide by the order to receive treatment and anti-discrimination training through an area NGO “whether or not he agrees with its basis.”
The nuns’ lawyer hailed the decision as unprecedented in Argentina in recognizing the plaintiffs’ plight and the deeper problem of gender discrimination.
“It’s shatters the ‘established order’ since it targets an individual with an important deal of power,” said José Viola, the lawyer.
In recent years, several distinguished cases have emerged involving nuns, laywomen or consecrated women denouncing spiritual, psychological, physical or sexual abuse by once-exalted priests.
But complaints have largely fallen on deaf ears on the Vatican and within the all-male hierarchy on the local level in Argentina, apparently prompting the nuns in Salta to hunt treatment within the secular justice system. The same dynamic played out when the clergy abuse of minors scandal first erupted many years ago and victims turned to the courts due to inaction by church authorities.
The 20 nuns from the reclusive order of Discalced Carmelites at San Bernardo Monastery — dedicated to solitude, silence and each day contemplative prayer — brought their case forward in 2022, sending shockwaves through conservative Salta.
Their complaints cited a variety of mistreatment including verbal insults, threats, humiliation and physical — although not sexual — assault.
The nuns describe archbishop Mario Cargnello as grabbing, slapping and shaking women. At one point, they said, Cargnello squeezed the lips of a nun to silence her. At one other, he pounced on a nun, pinning her to the bottom. They also accused Cargello of borrowing nuns’ money without paying them back.
Cáceres, the judge, described the instances as a part of a pattern of “physical and psychological gender violence” generated by the church’s rigid hierarchy and culture of silence.
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Associated Press writers Nicole Winfield in Rome and Isabel DeBre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, contributed to this report.
