Calls to remove bishop for concealing priest’s laicisation

Italian groups supporting victims of clergy sex abuse have called for the resignation of Bishop Diego Coletti of the northern Diocese of Como after it was discovered that he tried to keep quiet Pope Francis’ laicisation of an abusive priest, writes Robert Mickens.

Bishop Coletti, 72, claimed he was acting under the Pope’s instructions, but the families of those abused by the former priest – Marco Mangiacasale – said it was the bishop’s decision to keep the news secret. “The word ‘secret’ is not written in the [Vatican’s] sentence… on the contrary, it says the Pope allows the bishop to decide whether to make it public for the good of the families,” the same families said. “Coletti was the one that imposed the obligation of privacy… and now he’s looking for excuses to drag Pope Francis into this.”

The Diocese of Como confirmed on 12 February that the Pope had dismissed Mangiacasale, 50, from the clerical state on 11 December 2013, just 11 weeks after the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith concluded a canonical trial against the former priest. Italian civil authorities had sentenced him to three-and-a-half years of reclusion (first in prison, and currently under house arrest) in 2012.