Catholic Church
The Vatican has asked the Belgian bishops to draw up a new file on the accusations against Bishop Roger Vangheluwe. If new facts are brought to light, the Pope may take away Vangheluwe’s ecclesiastical titles.
The request is said to have come from the Vatican last week, after which the file was sent to Rome. Nuncio Franco Coppola, the Pope’s representative in Belgium, confirmed to Het Laatste Nieuws on Monday that he had forwarded a complete file on Vangheluwe. Geert De Kerpel, spokesperson for the bishops’ conference, cannot confirm whether there are new facts in the file.
Vangheluwe resigned from his position as bishop of Bruges in 2010 after confessing that he had abused his underage cousin for years. He currently resides in France. At the end of September, after Bishop Johan Bonny asked him to give up his titles during a visit, Vangheluwe sent a letter to the pope. No one knows what is in that letter. Coppola stated in Het Laatste Nieuws on Monday that he suspects that Vangheluwe did not ask to be removed from his clerical post. “Normally, that application would have been approved and published within two months,” it said.
In October, a first letter was sent from the bishops’ conference urging Rome to “address the matter as soon as possible”. Without new elements, the “administrative sanction” that Vangheluwe received from Rome in 2010 remains in force. As a result, Vangheluwe is no longer allowed to exercise his office. Bishop Bonny previously said that he hopes that the social outrage will count as a new fact: “It may not apply specifically to him, but the context is different now,” Bonny told De Standaard.
(Say, Kab)
