Vatican begins push-back against ex-ambassador over Kim Davis
VATICAN CITY — The Vatican is starting to push back against Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, author of the bombshell accusation of sex abuse cover-up against Pope Francis, with a statement Sunday from its former spokesman about a controversial 2015 meeting Vigano organized with Kentucky clerk Kim Davis.
The Rev. Federico Lombardi and his English-language assistant, the Rev. Thomas Rosica, issued a joint statement disputing Vigano's claims about the encounter he organized with Davis, an anti-gay marriage campaigner, during Francis' September 2015 visit to the United States.
News of the Davis audience made headlines at the time and was viewed by conservatives as a papal stamp of approval for Davis, the Rowan County clerk at the center of the U.S. gay marriage debate. The Vatican furiously sought to downplay it, with Lombardi saying the meeting by no means indicated papal support for Davis and insisting that the only private audience Francis held in Washington was with his former student: a gay man and his partner.
The Sept. 24, 2015 meeting and ensuing controversy has been cited as evidence of the frosty relations between Vigano and Francis that predated Vigano's remarkable denunciation of how Vatican officials starting in 2000 knew of sexual misconduct allegations against ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick but covered them up.
Read more: https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2018/09/04/vatican-begins-push-back-over-kentucky-clerk-kim-davis/1188780002/