(LifeSiteNews) — An Italian layman has reported a Catholic bishop to police for the latter’s apparently disrespectful remarks about Catholicism and devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Lawyer Francesco Minutillo has formally filed a report to the Italian Public Prosecutor’s Office to advise that Bishop Livio Corazza may have committed the crime of insulting the Catholic religion under Articles 403 and 404 of the Penal Code. Specifically, the bishop may have insulted the local Catholic devotion to the Madonna del Fuoco (“Our Lady of the Fire”), his diocese’s patroness. In his report, Minutillo referenced statements Minutillo made during the solemn Pontifical Mass on February 4 in the Madonna’s honor.
In Italian legal language, a report (“esposto”) is not a formal legal action but merely a statement for the competent authorities about situations that could represent potential crimes. If the authorities verify the criminal nature, then formal charges, investigations, and trials would follow.
During the homily, Bishop Corazza of Forlì-Bertinoro reportedly equated Catholicism to Islam, following Pope Francis’s statement in the Abu Dhabi Declaration on Human Fraternity. The bishop’s novel doctrine was diametrically opposed to the interpretation of the Abu Dhabi statement made a few months ago by another Italian bishop, Monsignor Antonio Suetta, Bishop of Sanremo-Ventimiglia.
According to Bishop Corazza, the Abu Dhabi Declaration was “as happy and providential” as the devotion to Our Lady of the Fire. He added, “May Our Lady help us extinguish the flames of division. Only in this way will we be able to look at her image without shame.” And further: “Let us unite, believers and non-believers, for the sole reason of being thinkers, to renew the pact of our mutual humanity, in the name of Mary of Nazareth.”
The devotion to Our Lady of the Fire centers on a portrait of the Madonna and Child that escaped destruction during a conflagration in 1428 and has been displayed since then in Forlì’s Santa Croce cathedral.
READ: Pope Francis plans major inter-faith event for ‘fraternity’ between Catholics and Muslims
Minutillo reported that the bishop’s remarks were a “shameful statement made boldly right in front of the Marian relic” and that “it constitutes a grave offense, not only to Our Lady of the Fire, but to the entire Catholic faith, as the Abu Dhabi Document explicitly denies the uniqueness of God and the kingship of Christ in its first article, effectively equating the Holy Trinity with the Allah of Muslims and any other religious invention.”
The lawyer also denounced the intrinsically Masonic origins of the theses within the document signed by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Ahmad Al-Tayyib in 2019, ideas adopted by the Bishop of Forlì. “The Bishop insinuates that, without accepting the syncretistic vision of Universal Brotherhood, the faithful would not be worthy of looking at the icon of Our Lady of the Fire,” Minutillo wrote. In the lawyer’s opinion, the bishop’s remarks were an attempt to empty the Marian devotion of its true meaning and to turn the Madonna into a mere symbol of human unity.
Minutillo emphasized in his report to the police that “the Abu Dhabi Document promotes typical Masonic concepts, such as universal brotherhood and world peace, presented in a syncretistic and relativistic form, which empties the Catholic faith of its authentic meaning and replaces the communion of saints with a generic union among believers of all religions.”
Corazza had already expressed similar ideas three years ago, and for the same reasons, he was issued a warning under Canon 212 of the Code of Canon Law, which states that, “according to the knowledge, competence, and prestige which they possess, the faithful have the right and even at times the duty to manifest to the sacred pastors their opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church and to make their opinion known to the rest of the Christian faithful, without prejudice to the integrity of faith and morals, with reverence toward their pastors, and attentive to common advantage and the dignity of persons.”
Francesco Minutillo is best known for contributing to the complaint against the blasphemous exhibition in Carpi (see here and here). The exhibition was hosted, and defended, by Archbishop Erio Castellucci.
RELATED: Italian judge upholds blasphemy case against archbishop, painter of sacrilegious exhibit