Vatican appoints replacement at Swiss abbey tainted by abuse allegations
Pope Francis has appointed Jean-Michel Girard as the new head of the Abbey of Saint-Maurice in southern Switzerland. The prestigious Catholic institution has been embroiled in sexual abuse allegations involving priests.
This content was published on
3 minutes
RTS
Jean-Michel Girard, who was a senior cleric (provost) for Grand St Bernard, takes over from Abbot Jean Scarcella and the interim head Roland Jacquenoud.
Scarcella resigned in September, suspected of sexual abuse and its cover-up. He is being investigated as part of a Catholic Church abuse affair by the apostolic special investigator Joseph Bonnemain. Saint-Maurice is not under the jurisdiction of the diocese of Sion but reports directly to the Vatican.
His interim successor, Roland Jacquenoud, withdrew last week. He was accused of sexual abuse of an adult novice in a recent report by Swiss public television RTS. The Abbey of Saint-Maurice rejected this accusation last week.
In an interview with RTS on Tuesday, Jean-Michel Girard explained that he wants to be a “support” for the abbey, “which must continue to live. First for the members and then for all those who are linked to the life of the community of St-Maurice”.
He added: “We will have to assume the responsibilities linked to these abuses, first obviously towards the victims. We will have to shed light on what happened and finally take all measures essential so, if possible, that it does not happen again.”
Over a dozen people have reported “potential abuses linked to the Abbey of St-Maurice or the ecclesial environment”, the Office of the Attorney General of Valais announced on Wednesday.
The cantonal police and prosecutors are investigating each declaration.
The office added that “those accused benefit from the presumption of innocence during the preliminary procedure”. The aim of this procedure is to determine what acts took place and whether they can be prosecuted under Swiss law.
This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. You can find them here.
If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.
External Content
Your subscription could not be saved. Please try again.
Almost finished… We need to confirm your email address. To complete the subscription process, please click the link in the email we just sent you.
Popular Stories
More
Foreign affairs
European nations snub Swiss-made weapons over Ukraine restrictions
Switzerland will deliver rubble removal equipment to Ukraine
This content was published on
Thirty rubble removal machines and thirty fire-fighting pumps: this is the equipment that Switzerland will be delivering to the Ukraine in the next few days. The total value of these goods is 5.6 million Swiss francs.
A third of Swiss residents plan to change health insurers
This content was published on
After the announced sharp increase in premiums for 2025, about one in three people would be considering changing health insurance companies.
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.