A group of Discalced Carmelite nuns in Texas have launched a $1 million lawsuit against Bishop Michael Olson of Ft. Worth, alleging that the bishop abused his authority during an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct by the nuns’ mother superior. The suit also alleges the bishop inflicted emotional distress on the women and improperly confiscated a computer and cell phone they need to conduct essential business such as banking online.
“They’re emotionally traumatised. They’re scared. They’re fearful,” attorney Matthew Bobo, who is representing the nuns, told NBC 5, the local television station. “They don’t leave the monastery unless they seek medical care. They do prayer seven times a day. Most of the time it’s in silence … It’s a very private, cloistered, serene environment with very little interaction with the outside world. Even when parishioners attend mass, the nuns are separated from the parishioners. And so to have, for the first time ever, a bishop come in and start issuing mandates and start ordering them to do things and threatening to interdict their monastery, threatening to kick them out of the order, it is extremely traumatising and emotionally damaging to them.”
A statement posted on the diocesan website said that Bishop Olson received a report in April that Mother Superior Teresa Agnes Gerlach of the Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity had “committed sins against the Sixth Commandment and violated her vow of chastity with a priest from outside the Diocese of Fort Worth” and that “an ecclesiastical investigation” had begun. Bobo denied that Gerlach had an affair with a priest and noted that she was under medication when questioned by diocesan authorities and does not recall what she said.
In its court filing, the diocese asserted that “civil courts do not have subject-matter jurisdiction to adjudicate ecclesiastical disputes”.
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