Posted on 08/16/2015 9:36:18 AM PDT by marshmallow
ASUNCION, Paraguay (AP) -- Rogelio Livieres Plano, a former bishop in Paraguay who was revered by some for building a successful seminary but who was ousted by Pope Francis amid several controversies, has died. He was 69.
Livieres Plano died on Friday in a hospital in Buenos Aires, Argentina, from complications related to diabetes, Asuncion Archbishop Edmundo Valenzuela told The Associated Press.
Valenzuela said a group of Paraguayan clergy recently visited Livieres Plano in Buenos Aires.
"Happily we were able to say goodbye to our brother Rogelio" before he died, said Valenzuela.
Livieres Plano was a member of the conservative Opus Dei movement and spent 10 years overseeing the diocese of Ciudad del Este, a sprawling city in eastern Paraguay that borders Brazil.
He was ousted in September by Francis, and the Holy See has never specified why. The bishop asserted he had been "persecuted" for his conservative orthodoxy by liberal parishioners and fellow bishops.
An Associated Press review in June found that the bishop made several questionable spending decisions during his tenure. Those included failing to use a $350,000 donation for its intended purpose of helping poor families, selling diocese properties without Vatican approval and using diocese funds to pay his brother for unspecified services.
Nearly $1 million in debt came to light after Livieres Plano was removed.
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
The Pope hates El Opus, but the big problem is that an Argentinian was recently appointed as head of Opus Dei and they are not opposing this heterodox pope in any way, shape or form. And Opus Dei is not supporting its own members because it’s afraid of being suppressed or marginalized by Pope Francis.
Livieres was very good and nothing he did would have been in any way questionable...except that he was viewed as conservative (and despite the fact that his diocese yielded many, many more vocations than anywhere else in that region). He had enemies in his own country and in the more powerful Argentina, and Pope Francis obviously unleashed them.
The Jesuits hate Opus Dei, because they essentially replaced them as loyal supporters of the Pope. Having a Jesuit Pope complicates things still further.
RIP.
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