From OSV News:
The Knights of Columbus has announced the Catholic fraternal organization will cover mosaics by ex-Jesuit Father Marko Rupnik at the St. John Paul II National Shrine in Washington and the Holy Family Chapel at the Knights’ headquarters in New Haven, Connecticut.
In a July 11 statement, the Knights said the decision came at “the conclusion of a careful and thorough process.”
The mosaics will be obscured by fabric “which will remain in place at least until the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) issues its decision on the pending sexual abuse cases against artist Father Marko Rupnik.”
After that, the Knights said, “a permanent plaster covering may be in order.”
A Catholic fraternal organization founded by Blessed Michael McGivney in 1882, the Knights of Columbus has 2.1 million members in over 16,800 local councils, and its charitable fund has given out $100 million in grants to Catholic and charitable groups since 2019.
“Shrines are places of healing, prayer and reconciliation. They should not cause victims further suffering.”
In April, the Knights’ Patrick Cardinal O’Boyle Council 11302, based in Washington, reportedly adopted an April 9 resolution urging the fraternal organization’s executive leadership to remove and replace mosaics created by Father Rupnik for the St. John Paul II National Shrine, which the Knights established in the nation’s capital in 2011. The resolution was disclosed April 16 by The Pillar, which stated it had obtained a copy of the document.
Father Rupnik, whose distinctive mosaics are known for their oversized black, almond-shaped eyes, was expelled from the Society of Jesus in 2023 after refusing to obey the order’s measures imposed in response to credible accusations that he spiritually, psychologically or sexually abused some two dozen women and at least one man. However, he remains a priest living and working in Rome as the director of art and dean of theology at Centro Aletti, the religious art community he founded in 1991.
“Shrines are places of healing, prayer and reconciliation. They should not cause victims further suffering,” Patrick Kelly, the Supreme Knight of the Knights of Columbus, said in the July 11 statement.
