Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò is challenging journalists to uncover a "cache of documents" Pope Benedict XVI delivered Pope Francis after his election, following his claims that the pontiff knew about the sanctions imposed by Benedict on former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick but chose to make him a "kingmaker" anyway.
"I spoke out because at this point the corruption has reached the top levels of the hierarchy of the Church," Viganò said in an interview with Aldo Maria Valli, the Italian journalist who helped him publish a controversial 11-page letter he wrote that accused several senior church officials of covering up allegations that McCarrick had been commiting sexual abuse.
"I ask journalists: why are they not asking what ever happened to the cache of documents that, as we all saw, Pope Benedict had delivered to Pope Francis at Castel Gandolfo?" the archbishop added.
Sexual abuse victims and journalists are also now protesting outside the Vatican embassy in Washington while demanding the documents, reports PJ Media.
Viganò also has claimed that McCarrick, who was removed from public ministry by the Holy See in June, had become Pope Francis' most trusted adviser concerning relations with President Donald Trump's administration.
The National Catholic Register's Edward Pentin reported that Viganò fears his life is in danger and has gone into hiding. Meanwhile, Monsignor Jean-François Lantheaume, the former first counsellor at the apostolic nunciature in Washington, D.C., says Viganò is telling the truth.
Last week, groups representing survivors of abuse by priests called on the Vatican to make a list of accused priests public.
Peter Isley, with the group Ending Clergy Abuse, commented during a press conference that the McCarrick dossier contains "underlying facts" on Popes Francis, Benedict, and John Paul about how they covered up sexual abuse in the church.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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