Vatican expels founder of Peru’s Sodalitium religious movement
Following an investigation, the Vatican’s Dicastery for Consecrated Life has expelled Luis Fernando Figari, founder of the Peruvian religious movement Sodalitium, who was removed several years ago from the leadership of the movement he founded in the 1970s, due to accusations of psychological and sexual abuse, particularly of minors, and financial irregularities.
By Salvatore Cernuzio
Luis Fernando Figari, founder of the Peruvian apostolic society Sodalitium Christianae Vitae (SVC), better known as Sodalicio, finds himself subject to a measure from the Holy See, expelling him from the movement that he himself created.
The movement had already been placed under supervision due to cases of abuse and financial mismanagement by its leaders. Figari, in particular, is accused of physical, psychological and sexual violence, particularly against minors.
The Episcopal Conference of Peru has made public the decree issued by the Dicastery for Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, which, by virtue of canon 746 of the Code of Canon Law, effectively expelled Figari from the organization founded in the 1970s and which had spread in Latin America through these communities.
These communities were often called “sodalites,” and were composed of lay people and consecrated priests living together under perpetual vows of celibacy and obedience.
For years, Sodalicio represented one of the most active forces of evangelization in South America.
The accusations
The first accusations of abuse emerged in the early 2000s, following complaints from former members and media investigations.
The case then exploded in 2015 with the publication of a book collecting testimonies from victims and detailing the physical, psychological and sexual abuse perpetrated by the movement’s leaders and by Figari himself.
Ban on returning to Peru
In 2018, the Peruvian prosecutor’s office requested the preventive detention of several members and former members of the organization, including Figari.
Sodalicio itself had created an investigation group that, through a report, identified the perpetrators of these crimes – who were later expelled from the movement – committed between 1975 and 2002 against around 36 people, including 19 minors.
That same year, a Vatican measure prohibited Figari from returning to his country “except for very serious reasons and always with the written authorization” of the commissioner appointed after the crisis, the Colombian bishop Noel Antonio Londoño Buitrago, prelate of Jericó (Antioquia), who had worked alongside the American cardinal Joseph William Tobin, appointed in 2016 “pontifical delegate” to lead the governance of this ecclesial reality and who then remained “referent”, particularly for financial matters.
Figari’s ban on returning to Peru was motivated by fears that he might “cause further harm to people,” “hide and destroy evidence against him” or “obstruct the course of ecclesiastical and civil justice.”
This is explained in a letter signed by Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, Prefect of Consecrated Life, published in June 2018 in response to accusations by local media that the Vatican had somehow “protected” Figari.
Papal envoys
In July 2023, Pope Francis sent two special investigators to the Andean country to “investigate, listen and report” on the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae case.
These were the same two experts who had carried out similar work a few years earlier in Chile, a country deeply shaken by past and present abuse scandals, namely the Archbishop of Malta, Charles Scicluna, and the Spanish priest, Father Jordi Bertomeu, both members of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.
