Accused of having an affair with a woman – Corriere.it

from our reporter

PARIS – The Pope accepted the resignation of Monsignor Michel Aupetit on Thursday, December 2, a few days after the Archbishop of Paris. He admitted he had “mysterious behavior with a woman” Put the mandate in Bergoglio’s hands. Monsignor Michel Aupetit, 70, who has been at the head of France’s most important diocese since December 2017, wrote a letter to the Pope after the French press provoked an intimate relationship with a woman in 2012, which he has always denied.

weekly the point About an embarrassing incident that occurred in the spring of 2020, when the Archbishop’s closest collaborator learned An email he accidentally sent to his secretary in February 2012, which was actually addressed to another woman. According to identical sources, the content of the email was unambiguous and showed an intimate relationship with that woman. a The relationship between two consensual adults and thus free from any criminal connection, but incompatible with the obligation of celibacy The Church foretold him: if he had learned of similar behavior by a priest of his diocese, the archbishop would have had to suspend him.

The Apostolic Ambassador in Paris, Celestino Migliore, has been aware of the e-mail since May 2020, when internal investigation It was entrusted to Aupetit’s predecessor, Cardinal André Vingt-Trois. After the article was published, the subject became known to the public, and the Archbishop of Paris, a former doctor known for his stern positions on the termination of pregnancy, the family and bioethics, explained his position first: “When I was a vicar in general, a woman came to me on several occasions with visits and letters, so much so that in Sometimes I had to put a certain distance between us. However, I am aware that my behavior towards him may have been ambiguous, suggesting an intimate relationship and sexual relations between us, which I vehemently deny.».

Then came the decision to write to the Pope: ‘However, the word resignation is not the word I used in the letter – the apetite specified in the Catholic daily La Croix -. Resignation means giving up the position. Indeed, I return it to the hands of the Holy Father, because it was he who gave it to me. I have done so to preserve the diocese because, as a bishop, I must put myself at the service of the unity of the ChurchThe story of the Archbishop of Paris came at a very sensitive moment for the Church of France, a few weeks after the publication of The Sauvé report documenting multiple serious cases of child sexual abuse (From 1950 to today, 330,000 people have been victims of child sexual abuse in the French Church.) Aupetit’s relationship with the woman has nothing to do with pedophilia, but it does add to an already difficult situation. While waiting for a successor to be determined, the Pope entrusted the temporary phase to George Pontier Honorary Archbishop of Marseille and former President of the Conference of French Bishops.