The answer emerged during a conference in Atlanta, in the southeast of the United States, on Friday June 21. Coming to participate in the conference of the Federation of Catholic Media, the prefect of the dicastery for communication Paolo Ruffini was questioned about the regular use, by the official Vatican sites, of mosaics by Marko Rupnik. This Slovenian mosaicist, well known in the Catholic world, was dismissed in July 2023 from his order, the Society of Jesus, while he was the target of dozens of complaints from women accusing him of rape, touching and influence, against a backdrop of spiritual justification.
“Removing, erasing, destroying art has never been a good choice,” Paolo Ruffini justified himself, according to comments reported by the Jesuit magazine America. The Italian communicant above all affirmed that he wanted to wait for the judgment issued by the dicastery for the doctrine of the faith, at the end of an ongoing trial, to make a decision. “We are talking about matters that we do not know. Who am I to judge Rupnik’s stories? »he argued, before adding: “I think as Christians we need to understand that closeness to the victims is important, but I don’t know if removing Rupnik’s art is a way to get closer to them. »
These comments come at a time when in France, the Lourdes sanctuary must soon make its decision on the fate reserved for the mosaics by Marko Rupnik which adorn the Notre-Dame du Rosaire basilica. But they also reveal, more broadly, a Roman state of mind. Because in the Eternal City, the work of the priest, now incardinated in a diocese in Slovenia, is omnipresent. The Italian capital has no less than 43 chapels or churches adorned with the work of the mosaicist and its Aletti center, a workshop placed under the protection of the diocese of Rome. Places of worship to which must be added three others, located directly on the territory of the Vatican. That’s a fifth of Rupnik’s 231 works around the world.
In the heart of the Vatican
Its mosaics are displayed, for example, in the Redemptoris Mater chapel, in the heart of the Apostolic Palace. Commissioned under the pontificate of John Paul II, inaugurated in 1999, they were described, at the time, as a “grandiose work”, where Eastern and Western traditions intersect. An obligatory passage for visitors received by the Pope in audience on the second floor of the Palace, its walls present biblical scenes. Another place in the Vatican thus decorated: the chapel of the dicastery for divine worship and the discipline of the sacraments, covered with the famous mosaics since 2005.
Elsewhere in Rome, the other places presenting the work of Marko Rupnik are no less important. This is the case of the chapel of the major pontifical seminary in the capital. Since 2021, the main place of prayer for future priests in Rome has been covered in paintings by the former Jesuit. For the occasion, old mosaics, which had been inaugurated in 1965 by Paul VI himself, disappeared, hidden today behind a partition erected in the choir to make way for those of Rupnik. Covering the entire walls, from floor to ceiling, the Slovenian’s drawings spread over 1,700 m2, representing scenes from the Old and New Testaments, in reds, oranges and yellows which saturate the space.
At the French Seminary
Many general curiae, a sort of Roman headquarters for religious congregations around the world, have also called on the mosaicist. This is the case of the Jesuits but also of the Marianists or the Hospitaller Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. French seminarians training in Rome also find the mosaicist in their chapel, as well as in the refectory where they take their meals three times a day. Pontifical colleges, polyclinics and parishes complete this long list.
“We are not going to remove these works, there is no reason to do so, annoys a Cardinal de Curie. Can you imagine if we did that with Michelangelo? » An argument that we often find with Caravaggio, accused of being a murderer but also, by some, of pedophilia. Two references also used, in Atlanta, by the highest communications official of the Holy See.
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Lourdes will soon make its decision
2008. For the 150th anniversary of the Marian apparitions, the sanctuary decorated the facade of the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary with immense mosaics on the luminous mysteries of the Rosary, ordered from the workshop of Marko Rupnik.
Spring 2023. The question of leaving in place, removing or hiding from the public these mosaics in Lourdes was the subject of a reflection group, while the sanctuary is intended as a place of consolation also for victims of sexual violence in the Church . The bishop, the rector, a victim, an expert in sacred art and a psychotherapist make up this commission.
The decision is expected to be announced soon. Mgr Jean-Marc Micas met Pope Francis on Friday June 21 in Rome, without it being known whether the matter was discussed.
