Pope's enforcers use threat of visitation to coerce Faithful

What is behind the cancellation of Gänswein's conference at the Spanish University Foundation?

The former personal secretary of Benedict XVI was banned as a result of the pressure that the Spanish University Foundation has received.

Last Wednesday, an event organized by the Spanish University Foundation was to be held in which it was commemorated that thirty years ago Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger presented the New Catechism of the Catholic Church at the headquarters of said Foundation. This event did not take place. Two days before the event, the Foundation contacted the German archbishop via email to inform him that the event was being suspended without giving him further explanations.

The day before the conference was held, the FUE issued a brief note announcing that it was suspending the event for "organizational reasons." An excuse that is difficult to believe, although when asked by this media they assured that they had not received any pressure to cancel Gänswein's event in Madrid. Some testimonies have reached this editorial office from people who were planning to attend the event and who came from outside Madrid, which is why they lost the money for trains and hotels they had reserved.

What is behind the veto of Gänswein?

As we already reported, this medium has been able to learn from various sources that the pressures received by the Foundation, specifically its President Lydia Jiménez, are real and have come from Rome.

The presence of the former personal secretary of Benedict XVI, together with Rouco Varela and the Apostolic Nuncio, was taken advantage of by some progressive ecclesiastical media to attack the participants and generate a false controversy by announcing a kind of anti-Francis 'conclave' in the capital of Spain.

What we do not know, although it is easy to intuit, is the reason why Gänswein was ordered from Rome not to speak in Madrid. But now let's go with what we do know. InfoVaticana has learned from several sources that the president of the Lydia Jiménez Foundation received a call from the Nuncio, Monsignor Bernardito Auza.

In that telephone conversation, Bernardito Auza told Lydia Jiménez that they had to cancel Gänswein's event due to "orders from above." The consequence of not having done so would have been that the Vatican would have orchestrated an Apostolic Visitation to the secular Institute of the Crusades of Mary, of which she is president.

A threat of this caliber was enough for Lydia Jiménez to call off the event with the German prelate. Regarding the Crusades of Mary, there are some complaints about abuses of conscience, which is why the president of the University Foundation is afraid that the Vatican will dare to inspect them. Furthermore, according to other sources, another of Lydia Jiménez's fears is that they will dig into the accounts of the Catholic University of Ávila of which she is President of the Board of Directors.

Who is Lydia Jiménez?

Lydia Jiménez Gacía was born in San Martín de Pimpollar (Ávila) in 1945. She met Father Tomás Morales SJ in 1965, a few months after his arrival in Madrid. Since 1971 she has collaborated closely with him in the beginning and creation of the Santa María Crusades Secular Institute. She has studied Educational Sciences and Philosophy at the Complutense University of Madrid and has been a professor at the University of Valladolid.

In May 1999, Pope John Paul II appointed her as a consultant to the Pontifical Council of the Family, a position that was renewed in August 2004 and later in 2009. She has also been a consultant to the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life. In November 2010 she was elected president of CEDIS (Spanish Confederation of Secular Institutes).

Currently she is general director of the Crusades of Santa María Secular Institute, member of the Board of Directors of the International Thomist Society and president of the Board of Directors of the “Santa Teresa de Jesús” Catholic University of Ávila. She is also president of the Board of Trustees of the Teresa de Ávila Foundation.

She has led numerous rounds of Spiritual Exercises to young girls, in a regime of solitude and silence, in the Ignatian way, dedicating herself tirelessly to the formation of each one.

She has promoted the creation of the “Berit Family Institute” in Spain and Latin America, of which she has been Director since 1998. From May 1999 to 2016 she has been a consultant for the “Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life” and, since 2001, consultant to the “Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.” She has also been president of CEDIS (Spanish Confederation of Secular Institutes) on two occasions.

In October 2012, she participated as an auditor in the Synod of Bishops convened by Pope Benedict XVI on the new evangelisation for the transmission of the Christian faith.

In October 2022, she was unanimously elected President of the Spanish University Foundation, replacing Cardinal Osoro.

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