ROME (LifeSiteNews) — The disgraced priest Father Marko Ivan Rupnik is now officially no longer part of the Jesuit order after he did not appeal his expulsion from the order during the allotted 30-day time period.
In a statement issued July 24, Rupnik’s now-former superior Father Johan Verschueren, S.J., confirmed that Rupnik was no longer a Jesuit. “We can declare today that he is no longer a Jesuit religious,” Verschueren wrote.
Rupnik’s decree of dismissal was delivered to him on June 14, and he had 30 days to appeal it. Shortly after that, his Rome-based art center—the Aletti Center—issued a statement revealing that Rupnik had already begun an application to leave the Jesuits as far back as January 21, 2023.
READ: Jesuits expel alleged serial abuser Fr. Rupnik, but he remains a priest
As LifeSite has covered extensively here, Rupnik was, on paper, expelled for refusal to obey his superiors. He has been accused of psychologically and sexually abusing 20 of the 40 religious sisters in the Loyola Community in Slovenia, of which he was a co-founder. The Jesuits have compiled a 150-page dossier of reported instances of abuse that Rupnik is said to have committed. These date from 1985 to 2018, and Rupnik’s former superior Fr. Johan Verschueren stated that the credibility of the allegations against Rupnik is “very high.”
Additionally, he was automatically excommunicated and found guilty by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s court of absolving in confession a woman with whom he had sexual relations. He subsequently had the penalty revoked—with much speculation over whether Pope Francis personally intervened to swiftly lift the excommunication.
Rupnik expelled, but artwork still praised
In his July 24 statement, Verschueren wrote that such a request was not a “right” for Rupnik to claim due to his Jesuit vows of “a lifetime commitment of obedience.”
“The reason why the Society did not want to grant this request of his stemmed from a desire to bind him to his responsibilities in the face of so many accusations, inviting him to embark on a path of truth and confrontation with the evil denounced by so many people who felt hurt,” wrote Verschueren. “Unfortunately, he did not wish to accept this invitation from us and we found ourselves in the need to discharge him from the Society for the reasons already stated elsewhere.”
The Jesuit superior added how he “cannot but greatly regret this insistent and stubborn inability [by Rupnik] to confront the voices of so many people who have felt hurt, offended and humiliated by his behavior and conduct towards them.”
He did, however, defend Rupnik’s work to some extent, echoing comments he has previously made in which he did not find an issue with Rupnik’s artwork, despite it being intimately linked to his alleged sexual and spiritual abuse.
“What has been said does not exclude the good he did, and the spiritual fruit of which he was a conduit for many and many others in the Church,” added Verschueren. “However, it behooves us to remember what Jesus taught us, ‘If therefore you present your offering on the altar and there you remember that one of your brothers or sisters has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, go first to be reconciled with your brother or sister, and then return to offer your gift.’”
While no longer a Jesuit, Rupnik nevertheless remains a priest, with arguably more freedom than he has previously enjoyed, and now no longer subject to the restrictions placed on his activities by the Jesuit superiors.
Verschueren defended Rupnik’s remaining in the clerical state, arguing that such a matter was for the Holy See to decide rather than the Jesuits. He added:
I have always wished as Major Superior, in the various circumstances of these long and complex affairs, to be able to initiate a process that could guarantee the judicial ascertainment of the facts, the right to defense and the consequent sanctioning penalties (or possible acquittal), but various reasons, including the current limitations of the regulations regarding similar situations, have not allowed this.
READ: Former nun details years of ‘satanic’ sex abuse by Jesuit priest Fr. Rupnik
Verschueren’s praise of Rupnik’s art is notable, given that alleged victims of the priest have linked it to his abuse. A former member of Rupnik’s Loyola Community, under the pseudonym “Anna,” stated that Rupnik used his paintings as a way to garner interest in him and to cultivate relationships.
She added that “His sexual obsession was not extemporaneous but deeply connected to his conception of art and his theological thinking.”
Jesuits to cut ties with Rupnik’s art center
Rupnik has been a key figure at the Aletti Center for decades, with his high status and widespread influence in Rome and the Vatican particularly being thus firmly established. Many instances of his alleged abuse are reported to have taken place at the Center also, which is situated close to the Papal Basilica of Mary Major.
Unsurprisingly, priests and staff at the Center have publicly supported Rupnik since the emergence of his scandal broke into the public sphere in December 2022.
But Verschueren revealed that the Jesuits’ “firm desire” was to officially “distance itself also juridically from the Aletti Center, formally exiting the Public Association of Faithful that bears the same name and finding the best way to terminate partnership relations with the Center.”
READ: Vatican to continue promoting Rupnik’s images despite link to his alleged sex abuse
Yet while the collaboration may be cut with the Jesuits, at least on paper, the Aletti Center remains closely intertwined with the Vatican. One individual in particular, Natasa Govekar, is listed as the director of the Dicastery for Communications’ Theological-Pastoral Department. She is also a member of the Aletti Center, where she works on the “theology of images.”
Her presence has been key at the Dicastery since its inception, and she is responsible for monitoring and operating the Pope’s Instagram and Twitter accounts. She has for many years been welcomed as a keynote speaker at conferences on Catholic journalism due to her leading role at the Vatican.
Given this, it is perhaps hardly surprising that the Rupnik artwork continues to be promoted by the Vatican’s numerous online sites and social media accounts.
Indeed, the disgraced priest continues to enjoy even papal promotion, with Pope Francis highlighting one of Rupnik’s pieces of art in a recent video message. Published online on June 1 by the Vatican, the video showed the Pope deliver brief thoughts to the 16th Marian Congress, then being held in Aperacida, and showcased an image created by the abusive priest.
With Rupnik now officially outside the Jesuit order, it remains to be seen whether he will be allowed to disappear from public scrutiny and enjoy wide-reaching and unknown freedom of movement or if he will seek to re-establish the continued success of his lucrative art projects around the world.