Full dossier on Cardinal Prevost's running of his Diocese

On Sunday, September 8, 2024, the main journalistic program on Peruvian television “Cuarto Poder” of América Televisión (Channel 4) dedicated a 12-minute report entitled "Former bishop of Chiclayo kept cases of sexual abuse silent," in which it denounced the current Cardinal Robert Prevost, current prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, of having covered up cases of sexual abuse in his diocese, when he was bishop of Chiclayo (Peru). The news was picked up by other Peruvian media outlets, including some of the most influential: 

And he was put in charge of the Congregation of Bishops with this record

La Republica

Alta Voz

By a Latin American portal: 

And finally in Spain through the Catholic portal Infovaticana: 

 The details of a long story In the first days of April 2022, sisters Ana María, Juana Mercedes, and Aura Teresa Quispe Diaz met with Bishop Robert Prevost, to denounce the priest Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles, known as Father “Lute”, for sexual abuse. 

IMPORTANT: Ana María is the only one who has publicly identified herself as a victim of abuse by Fr. “Lute” and the priest Ricardo Yesquén, the identity of the other two sisters has been kept confidential, and they appear publicly only as “two additional confirmed victims.” The abuse occurred around 2004 when the sisters were between 9 and 14 years old. The victims suffered very similar abuses at the hands of "Lute": they were taken separately to villages far from the city on supposed missionary trips and spent the night with the priest, who made them share the same bed, stripped naked, subjected them to inappropriate touching, and rubbed his genitals. In 2020, Ana María, determined to report the abuse, had a telephone conversation with the then Bishop of Chiclayo, Robert Prevost, in which she spoke for the first time about the misconduct of the priest, who at the time was the parish priest in her diocese and in charge of the Santa María Magdalena parish in Ciudad Eten.

Lute enjoyed great popularity promoting devotion to the Divine Child and the only Eucharistic miracle recognized in Peru that occurred in that city. Prevost suggested Ana María file a complaint with the civil authorities, but restrictions due to the COVID pandemic prevented her from doing so. The sisters, who remained silent for many years out of shame and say they had blocked out these memories, decided to report "Lute" after discovering that the three had suffered similar abuse and feared there were other victims. Finally, after the worst of the pandemic, they met with Prevost and a priest—whom they have not identified—at the headquarters of the Diocese of Chiclayo in early April 2022. Prevost asked the sisters to leave their complaint in writing. They did so but did not receive any documentation from the bishop as proof of receipt. The three women claim that Prevost told them the Church had no way to investigate their case, that they should first file a complaint with the civil authorities, and that the decision of those authorities would determine the opening of a case within the Church. 

"When we filed the complaint with Bishop Prevost, he apologized on behalf of the Church and said he believed us. That he had never heard of a complaint against Eleuterio; but that didn't mean the complaint was false. He emphasized that Eleuterio attracted more people than he did as a bishop. He also said that since Eleuterio had been in charge of Niño del Milagro, the complaint would be delayed a bit. He said he would speak with Eleuterio. He said he encouraged us to file a complaint with the public authorities because the Church had no way of investigating, and with these civil investigations, the Church could use them to sanction them." He also referred them to the Listening Center that Prevost himself created a few weeks before meeting with them. They then began communicating exclusively with the center's coordinator, Father Julio Ramírez. “During Bishop Robert Prevost's time in office, we only communicated with Julio, the director of the listening center. He received our letter. There was never an investigator to question us.” The three women went to the police station a month after meeting with Prevost to file the complaint and were sent to the Women's Emergency Center (CEM) closest to their home. They were assigned a lawyer and informed that due to the age of the case, “the statute of limitations had expired.” In June 2022, they learned from a local newspaper that Lute had been transferred to the parish of Santa Cruz, in the province of Cajamarca, which is also part of the Diocese of Chiclayo, where he continued to celebrate Mass. Parishioners in Ciudad Eten were informed that the priest was transferred due to alleged health problems.

On January 30, 2023, Bishop Prevost was appointed by Pope Francis as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops. He remained apostolic administrator in Chiclayo until assuming his post at the Vatican on April 12. The Pope appointed Bishop Guillermo Cornejo as apostolic administrator of Chiclayo. On November 11, 2023, Ana María recorded a telephone conversation with Father Julio Ramírez in which the latter admitted that Prevost sent Lute to Santa Cruz but did not impose any restrictions on him: "What Bishop Roberto did was take him out of (Chiclayo) and leave him at his home in Santa Cruz." "I'm not going to lie to you, it's not that they took away his licenses. The only thing Bishop Roberto told him was not to come to Chiclayo." However, Lute received permission from Prevost to attend a priestly ordination and the 2023 Chrism Mass, while Prevost was still in Chiclayo as apostolic administrator. In the same conversation, Ramírez also admitted that Lute had acknowledged "the facts," that he wanted to know the names of the accusers "to apologize," and that the priests who welcome him at the Santa Cruz parish do not know "all the details" of the allegations against him. Ramírez told Ana María that their names would not be disclosed to Lute. Following this conversation, on November 13, Ana María made her complaints public on social media, and the case of the three victims reached the local and Latin American press: 

Here Here and Here 

Only after Ana María made her complaint public did the three women receive a summons from the diocese of Chiclayo signed by judicial vicar Jorge Luis Sánchez Mora. Two of them appeared on December 11, 2023, and were questioned by Father Oswaldo Clavo, canonist of the Chota prelature and judicial vicar of the interdiocesan tribunal of Chota, Cajamarca, and Chachapoyas, appointed to investigate the case. Ana María did not appear for fear of reprisals due to Lute's popularity. The ecclesiastical investigator acknowledged to the victims that the complaint to Prevost "was useless"; that they should remain silent and not make further public complaints; that if there were "more complicated" cases in the Vatican, nothing would happen to Lute. “He (Clavo) told us that the interrogation was intended to reframe the facts and that it seemed strange to him that no investigation had been conducted in a year. At the time, the diocese of Chiclayo was headed by Monsignor Guillermo Cornejo Monzón (apostolic administrator who replaced Prevost in mid-April 2023 after his appointment by the Vatican). The investigator told us that she had to sign and that we were obligated to remain silent.”

“The questions were about what happened to us. From this, I realized that the complaint filed with Bishop Prevost had been useless. At that moment, the same investigator showed me the document Bishop Prevost had asked us to write and told me: ‘This little piece of paper is no longer useful. What is useful is what we did today.’ I told him that with that attitude, he made me understand that there was a lot of corruption in the Church. He replied that he was new to this and that he bears no responsibility and that he knew nothing about the case.” Both Father Clavo and Father Ramírez warned the women that the case would be sent to Rome but that their complaint could be dropped if the Vatican had “more complicated cases.” “We were never told that we should seek the advice of a canon lawyer. When we suffered attacks from those who support (Eleuterio), we, as victims, never received any support from the Diocese of Chiclayo. The only instruction we received was to remain silent from the investigator (Clavo), under the pretext of not interfering in the investigation.” A day after this meeting, Bishop Cornejo also admitted to the press that Father Lute had already acknowledged the facts and that at the end of November 2023 he had formally asked him not to celebrate Masses. He said that the priest “is under investigation” and the case “is well underway.” 

The Diocese of Chiclayo published an official statement on the case on December 12, 2023, regarding the allegations of the three women it recognizes as Lute's victims. It admits that they met with Prevost in April 2022. However, the statement raised several questions: The statement states that "the accused priest was summoned and asked to leave the parish and cease exercising his ministry. A preliminary investigation was initiated, which was then sent to the Holy See." This text contradicts statements by Ramirez regarding Prevost's decision to transfer Lute without restrictions to Santa Cruz and by investigator Clavo, who interviewed the victims for the first time the day before the statement and admitted that the investigation was just beginning with him. 

The statement states that "there is a 'Listening Center' in the Diocese, and the three victims went to speak with some professionals who offer their services to listen to and assist victims of abuse." The victims only acknowledge having had contact with Father Julio Ramirez, who was the center's coordinator at the time, but he was the only person assigned to it. There were no other staff members. 

The communiqué says that "the decision of the prosecutor's office was to close the case due to the statute of limitations and lack of evidence. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, seeing that the accusations presented against the accused priest have not been sufficiently proven, consequently decided to close the case pro nunc". The case was not closed for lack of evidence but because the statute of limitations had expired, and there is no document to prove that the case was closed pro nunc at the Doctrine of the Faith. According to one of the victims, "the document published by the diocese of Chiclayo says that the prosecutor's office has said that there is a lack of evidence. This is false, the prosecutor's office said that the crimes were time-barred under criminal law, but not that there was a lack of evidence. We have never seen any protection for us from the Diocese of Chiclayo".

The statement says that "the apostolic administrator of Chiclayo wanted to reopen the case for greater clarity of the facts." Two months later, as the new investigation was underway, on February 14, 2024, Pope Francis appointed Bishop Edinson Farfán Córdova, OSA, as the new Bishop of Chiclayo, replacing Cornejo. Farfán is also an Augustinian and a personal friend of Bishop Prevost, who co-consecrated him as bishop of the Prelature of Chuquibambilla in 2020. In Chuquibambilla, Bishop Farfán had been accused of covering up for an Augustinian priest accused of abuse, Father Juan Carlos Olaya. Journalist Eduardo Quispe Palacios, known in Peru for uncovering a corruption scandal that ended Pedro Castillo's presidency, addressed Lute's case, spending several days in Chiclayo investigating the Church's actions toward victims. Although no authority wanted to make a statement "on the record," Quispe Palacios confirmed that to date, the victims have not been interviewed in detail by a Church entity, and that the diocese only requested the notes from the complaint filed by the victims with the police. During his visit to Chiclayo, journalist Quispe, as would later happen with Cuarto Poder journalist Roxana Cueva, was systematically evaded by Church authorities, who have not come forward, not even through the press officer. Quispe conducted an extensive interview with Ana María, who has become an activist against the cover-up of sexual abuse cases in the Church under the slogan "For a Safer Church." 

Since November 2023, Ana María has actively used her public profiles on Facebook and TikTok to denounce the inaction of Church authorities in the face of the Lute abuse and other similar cases, while offering a platform of support to other victims. Ana María publicly asserts that at least 14 women have contacted her to give their testimony about alleged abuse by various priests, many of whom were active when Prevost was Bishop of Chiclayo. After the program "Cuarto Poder" aired on América Televisión (Channel 4) a segment dedicated to the victims' complaints and the negligence of then-Bishop Robert Prevost, the Diocese of Chiclayo published a lengthy statement trying to defend Prevost. The statement, published on October 10, 2024, reads: 

STATEMENT 

Regarding the report by the program Cuarto Poder on América Televisión, broadcast on Sunday, September 8, 2024, the Diocese of Chiclayo hereby informs the following:

1. In the first week of April 2022, three young men appeared before the Bishopric of Chiclayo to report Father Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles for alleged sexual abuse of minors. They were received and assisted by the then Bishop of Chiclayo, Msgr. Robert Francis Prevost, O.S.A. 

2. Upon receiving the complaint, and upholding the principle of the presumption of innocence at both the civil and ecclesiastical levels (CIC 1321 §1), precautionary measures were applied to initiate the preliminary investigation. The accused priest, who has never admitted to having committed the acts attributed to him, was removed from the parish to which he was assigned and prohibited from publicly exercising his priestly ministry. The priest accepted the imposition of these measures and therefore went to reside at his family home in the province of Santa Cruz. For their part, the young women also filed a complaint with the civil court. It should be added that the alleged victims were offered psychological support, if they so desired. 

3. On July 21, 2022, after completing the preliminary investigation, Bishop Robert Prevost sent the resulting file to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, the competent body of the Roman Curia for reports of sexual abuse of minors by the clergy, for review. 

4. In the first quarter of 2023, the Prosecutor's Office informed the young women that the case had been closed due to the statute of limitations on the reported events. 

5. On April 3, 2023, the Diocese of Chiclayo sent the Prosecutor's Office ruling on the statute of limitations on the events to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, as further documentation. 

6. While the case was being reviewed by the aforementioned Dicastery, on April 12, 2023, Bishop Robert Prevost took office as Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops in Rome. 

7. Subsequently, on August 10, 2023, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a response closing the case pro nunc. 

8. In November 2023, Ana María Quispe, one of the complainants, began a campaign demanding justice, particularly through social media, as she disagreed with the closing of the case in the civil and ecclesiastical jurisdictions. 

9. Bishop Guillermo Cornejo, then Apostolic Administrator of Chiclayo, responding to Ana María Quispe's public dissatisfaction, decided to reopen the case for the second time in the ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The victims were summoned again, but one of them did not appear: Ana María Quispe, who, when notified, publicly stated that she would not appear, citing security reasons. 

10. Once the investigation was concluded with the testimonies provided, the resulting file was sent back to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, leaving the case open to date.

 IN CONCLUSION: - The statements made by the program "Cuarto Poder" that Cardinal Robert Prevost covered up for the priest Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzáles and remained silent in the face of the accusations are NOT TRUE. It is also not true that the priest admitted to Cardinal Prevost that he committed the acts of which he is accused. From the moment the accusation was received, and maintaining the right to the presumption of innocence, the Church has proceeded in accordance with its guidelines, both in the preliminary investigation and in the application of precautionary measures: removal from the parish and prohibition from exercising the priestly ministry in public. 

- It is NOT TRUE that the priest Eleuterio Vásquez acknowledged the facts, the subject of the investigation, to Bishop Guillermo Cornejo. What he expressed in his statements to the press under "has acknowledged the facts," related to celebrating Mass publicly, and he has since stopped doing so. 

-It is NOT TRUE what is stated in the program when it states that "the Church has done nothing to investigate." As previously stated, the case was sent to the Holy See, closed due to lack of evidence, and, following a public appeal by one of the complainants, the case was reopened, reinvestigated, and is currently underway at the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. It should be added that, although it was publicly stated that there were more alleged victims, only two of the three who initially reported came forward to testify. 

-It is NOT TRUE to assert that the Catholic Church has turned its back on the alleged victims. On the contrary, they were free to file complaints in civil courts and were offered the necessary psychological support if they required it. - It constitutes a lack of transparency on the part of the "Cuarto Poder" program when the report only mentions the statement from the Diocese of Chiclayo, which details the actions taken by the program, without reading the content. - Regarding the case of Father Ricardo Yesquén, due to the serious degenerative illness from which he suffers, he is incapable of defending himself, and therefore no case can be opened against him. He has not exercised the priestly ministry for years. - The Diocese of Chiclayo expresses its commitment to protecting the physical and moral integrity of minors and vulnerable people, condemning any type of behavior that violates them. - Finally, the Diocese of Chiclayo calls on the "Cuarto Poder" program to rectify the information it publishes in pursuit of the primacy of truth in its journalistic work. P. FIDEL PURISACA VIGIL DIRECTOR Social Media Office DIOCESE OF CHICLAYO - PERU 

The day after the release of the statement, the three victims sent a long and detailed open letter to the television station and the diocese of Chiclayo in which they insisted again that then Bishop Prevost did not carry out a canonical investigation, as he should have, and demanded proof from the diocese that Prevost opened a legitimate canonical process, which they deny. In the letter, they state: “We must make it clear that our questioning of the Diocese of Chiclayo's conduct specifically covers the period from the receipt of the complaint on April 5, 2022, to November 2023. During this 19-month period, no investigation was carried out, nor were precautionary measures issued to protect the faithful and children; the case was only filed and archived. This period was occupied by then-Bishop Robert Francis Prevost Martínez OSA (until April 2023) and then continued by Bishop Guillermo Cornejo Monzón.” The letter from the three victims also states: 

“WE STRONGLY DENY the existence of a ‘preliminary investigation’ during the term of Bishop Robert Francis Prevost Martínez OSA. As proof of our claims, we point out that there is no decree opening a preliminary investigation, no decree issuing precautionary measures, we were never summoned to testify during that period by any investigator; nor was any act of inquiry issued at the places where the events occurred. Regarding this case, there is no document proving the existence of a preliminary investigation, no investigator's name appears, nor have any charges been filed regarding its referral to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, nor of the decree archiving the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, during the term of the bishop in question or in subsequent ones.” The victims demanded that the Diocese of Chiclayo “produce, within 48 hours of receiving this letter”: 

- The statements of the victims during the term of Bishop Robert Prevost Martínez. - The decree opening the Preliminary Investigation. 

- The decree of precautionary measures issued to the priests. - The mandates to carry out investigative acts in the present case. 

- The evidence of transmission to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith dated July 21, 2022. 

- The decree resolved by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith dated August 10, 2023. 

What most scandalizes these three victims is that the "investigation" under the new Bishop Farfán concluded by exonerating Prevost of any negligence or wrongdoing. The strange thing is that Prevost's exoneration was neither signed nor published by the Diocese of Chiclayo, but was only made known through a Catholic media outlet in Spain. Persecution against the victims' lawyer On May 6, 2024, the victims asked the Peruvian canonist Monsignor Ricardo Coronado Arrascue to act as their lawyer before the diocese. Bishop Coronado collected the signed and witness statements of the three victims. On June 14, 2024, the canon lawyer requested an audience with the new bishop of Chiclayo to request an explanation about the case, learn the current status of the proceedings, and inquire why Prevost had been cleared of liability. Bishop Farfán did not grant the audience but responded that "the preliminary investigation [of Prevost] cannot be considered part of the criminal process (judicial or administrative) nor does it replace its introductory phase. Its purpose, in fact, is not penal, but pastoral." However, Coronado has explained that in canon law there is no such thing as a “pastoral investigation”: the investigation is canonical or it is not an investigation. 

On June 23, Bishop Coronado sent a new letter to Bishop Farfán in which he denounced that “during the time that His Eminence Cardinal Robert Prevost was ordinary of the Diocese of Chiclayo, no investigation was opened under the pretext of waiting for the resolution of the prosecutor's office [civil authority].” The canonist questioned the veracity of the press release from the Diocese of Chiclayo of December 12, 2023, which stated that “the case has been archived by the prosecutor's office due to prescription and lack of evidence. Which is false. If there is a prescription, no jurisdictional body enters into an analysis of the merits of the matter, therefore, they have not ruled on the evidence. In this sense, the note is not truthful." "However, it does not say that for canonical discipline neither the crime nor the criminal action have expired. Nor does it say that canonical justice, although it may have State justice as a reference, does not depend on it. Therefore, the prosecutor's conclusion should not have affected the canonical process in any way," Coronado added. In the same letter, Coronado states that Prevost "failed to appoint and open an investigation in accordance with canon 1717 of the Code of Canon Law, which, following the public complaint made by Ana María Quispe Díaz, the apostolic administrator, Bishop Guillermo Cornejo Monzón, opened a formal investigation for the first time and appointed Father Oswaldo Clavo as investigator. This proves that there was no prior investigation and reveals a very serious omission by the previous ordinary [Prevost].” 

Coronado questions why the bishopric has not ordered any precautionary measures against Lute and claims to have testimony according to which Farfán “may have covered up for the Augustinian Juan Carlos Olaya Alvarado, when you were bishop of Chuquibambilla by order of the man who would today be your mentor [Prevost].” “It was my fervent wish that in the audience that Your Excellency would grant us in private, the same witness could have been presented to you and you could respond. Unfortunately, due to the procedural speed that the case demands, today I am forced to do so in writing." Coronado concluded this letter by demanding an answer to his questions, declining an audience with the new bishop, and requesting "to exercise the right of defense of my clients with access to the complete file of the case, without alterations." In response, Coronado received a letter from Farfán dated June 27 in which the bishop denied him the right or ability to intervene in the process, alleging that Coronado presented "photocopies and scanned documents" instead of the original documents. On July 5, Coronado responded to Farfán with a notarized letter in which he legitimized the documents supporting his request, accuses the bishop of delaying the process with a "leguleyada" [a Peruvian expression implying the abuse of the letter of the law], and renewed his requests of June 22. After that document, Coronado did not receive another response. On August 12, 2024, Cardinal Prevost was in Peru. and celebrated the 60th anniversary of the neighboring diocese of Chulucanas, after which he stayed for several days in Chiclayo.

On Saturday, August 24, unexpectedly and without canonical authority, the Peruvian Episcopal Conference published a press release announcing that Bishop Coronado cannot practice as a canonist in Peru, nor can he continue to defend his current clients, among whom, in addition to the three victims, are religious and clerics whose rights have been violated by their superiors or bishops. On August 29, Bishop Coronado was notified, through his lawyer, that the Bishop of Cajamarca, the diocese in which he is incardinated, Bishop Isaac Circuncisión Martínez Chuquizana, had "invited" him to leave the clerical state under penalty of initiating an administrative penal process apparently indicated by the Dicastery for the Clergy. According to Coronado, the effort to suppress the accusations against Prevost does not change the facts: that the current Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, in his handling of the accusations, has violated: Canon 1717 of the Code of Canon Law; Numbers 32 and following of the “Vademecum on Some Procedural Questions Regarding Cases of Sexual Abuse of Minors Committed by Clergy of the Holy See.”; Articles 1-7 of Pope Francis’ Apostolic Letter Vos Estis Lux Mundi; and Points 9-14 of the “New Guidelines for Intervention for the Procedure to Be Followed by Bishops in Possible Cases of Sexual Abuse of Minors and Vulnerable Persons by Clergy” of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference, drafted by Bishop Prevost himself. 

Prevost's Other Serious History of Sexual Abuse 

Robert Francis Prevost Martinez, OSA, was born on September 14, 1955, in Chicago, Illinois, United States. He is the son of Louis Marius Prevost, of French and Italian descent, and Mildred Martinez, of Spanish descent. He has two brothers. In 1977, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from Villanova University in Chicago, and in September of that year, he entered the novitiate of the Order of Saint Augustine in the Province of Our Mother of Good Counsel in Saint Louis. He made his solemn vows as an Augustinian on August 29, 1981. He studied theology at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago and was sent to Rome by the Augustinians to study canon law at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum). He was ordained a priest in Rome on June 19, 1982. He received his licentiate in 1984 and was sent to the Augustinian mission of Chulucanas, Piura, Peru (1985-1986). In 1987, he obtained his doctorate in canon law with his thesis "The Role of the Local Prior in the Order of Saint Augustine." He was elected director of vocations and missions in the Augustinian province of Mother of Good Counsel in Olympia Fields, Illinois, United States. In 1988, he was sent back to Peru, to the mission of Trujillo, as director of a formation project for Augustinian aspirants from the vicariates of Chulucanas, Iquitos, and Apurímac.  He served as prior of the community (1988-1992), director of formation (1988-1998), and master of the professed (1992-1998). He also served as judicial vicar of the Archdiocese of Trujillo (1989-1998) and as professor of canon law, patristics, and moral law at the major seminary of San Carlos y San Marcelo. In 1999, he was elected prior provincial of the Augustinian province of Mother of Good Counsel in Chicago. In 2001, the Ordinary General Chapter elected him Prior General of the Augustinians, and he was reelected for a second six-year term in 2007. As Prior General, he lived in Rome from 2001 to 2013. In October 2013, he returned to the United States to serve as Master of the Professed, and in June 2014, he was appointed Vicar Provincial of the Augustinians in Chicago, a position he held until November 3, 2014, when Pope Francis appointed him Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru. Pope Francis elevated him to the dignity of bishop and assigned him the titular see of Sufar. He took canonical possession on November 7 in the presence of the then Apostolic Nuncio to Peru, Bishop James Patrick Green; he was ordained a bishop on December 12 in the Cathedral of Chiclayo. During his episcopal service in Peru, he served as Second Vice President of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference (elected in March 2018) and as Apostolic Administrator of the Diocese of Callao from April 15, 2020. As a canonist, he was one of two bishops commissioned by the Peruvian Episcopal Conference to draft the New Guidelines for Intervention "For the Procedure to be Followed by Bishops in the Face of Possible Cases of Sexual Abuse of Minors and Vulnerable Persons by Clergy," approved by the Peruvian bishops on December 1, 2022. 

He served as Bishop of Chiclayo from November 26, 2016, until January 30, 2023, when Pope Francis appointed him Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops and President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America at the Vatican. The Pope previously appointed him to the Congregation for the Clergy in 2019 and to the Congregation for Bishops in 2020. This latest appointment surprised church analysts because Prevost was neither a cardinal nor a metropolitan archbishop. He joined two other Americans appointed by Pope Francis to the same dicastery: Cardinal Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago since September 2014 and a member of the bishops' dicastery since 2016; and Cardinal Joseph Tobin, archbishop of Newark. Pope Francis created him a cardinal in the consistory of September 30, 2023. The first cases of cover-up The Ray case The Chicago Sun-Times newspaper reported on February 26, 2021 that in September 2000, Father James Ray - accused of sexual abuse of minors - was authorized by then Father Robert Prevost, provincial superior of the Augustinians, to live at the St. John Stone Augustinian residence in Hyde Park, Chicago, a house located less than 100 meters from St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Elementary School. In 1990, Ray was accused of abusing a child during his time at St. Peter Damian Parish between 1984-1989. In 1991, he was removed from parish work and lived at the Augustinian residence from 2000 to 2002. He was reduced to a lay status in 2012, and according to the Illinois Attorney General's report on sexual abuse released in 2013, at least five people were victims of this former priest. The Chicago Archdiocese's archives show that the Augustinian residence was deemed suitable for Ray because "there is no school nearby," despite its proximity to St. Thomas the Apostle. There is no record from either the Augustinian Province or archdiocese officials noting this crucial detail. The McGrath Case Since 1986, Augustinian priest Richard J. McGrath OSA was the president of Providence Catholic High School in New Lenox, Illinois. In 2013, he was appointed treasurer of the Chicago Augustinian Province and worked alongside then-Vicar Provincial Provost. McGrath and Prevost lived in the same Augustinian community in New Lenox for part of 1988.

In late 2017, a Providence student reported seeing an image of a naked boy on Father McGrath's cell phone. The Augustinian priest refused to hand over his cell phone to police and was spared a criminal investigation. A few weeks after the case became public, McGrath was charged with sexually abusing and raping a child between 1995 and 1996, while he was president of the school and the victim was between 13 and 15 years old. McGrath was removed from public ministry, and in September 2018, it was reported that the Augustinians had moved him to St. John Stone Priest House in Hyde Park—the same Augustinian residence that had housed another abusive priest, James Ray, in 2000 and is located just a few yards from St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Elementary School. In September 2018, Cardinal Blase Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago and a member of the Dicastery for Bishops with Prevost, apologized to the school for allowing McGrath to live there, citing miscommunication. Cupich sent a letter to the school stating that his office was unaware that McGrath was being investigated for child abuse when it was notified of his move, and that if it had known, it would not have allowed him to live there. 

In December 2018, the Associated Press reported that McGrath's whereabouts were unknown and that he had left the Augustinian house of his own volition sometime earlier that year. Providence School and the Augustinians reached a settlement with Robert Krankvich, the alleged victim, in November 2023, awarding him $2 million in compensation. The Augustinians have not provided any information on McGrath's current canonical status. On November 30, 2023, David Clohessy, former director of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests), and Tim Law, founder of Ending Clergy Abuse (ECA), filed a formal complaint with the Apostolic Nuncio to the United States against Cardinals Prevost and Cupich, Bishops Ronald Hicks of Joliet and David Malloy of Rockford, and Father Anthony Pizzo, Prevost's successor as Prior General of the Augustinians, for allowing McGrath to live free, unsupervised, and unpunished, with his whereabouts unknown due to their inaction and lack of cooperation. The signatories called on the Vatican to take "severe, immediate, and corrective" measures against the five officials due to their "repeated and willful recklessness, insensitivity, and secrecy" in the McGrath case. Attorney Josh Peck of the abuse law firm Jeff Anderson & Associates called in December 2023 for the Augustinians to be held accountable in the McGrath case for failing to take immediate steps to protect McGrath's children and for failing to publish a list of clergy members with credible allegations of sexual abuse. "The actions of Richard McGrath and Augustinian officials are not isolated cases. Covering up for offenders, evading accountability, and putting children in danger remain the modus operandi of much of the Catholic hierarchy," Peck charged.

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