Press Release 2 November 2015: “surprised and saddened”

Press Release from the Opus Dei Information Office on the arrest of Msgr. Lucio Angel Vallejo Balda.

Statement from the Rome Communications Office of the Prelature of Opus Dei

November 2, 2015

This office has received requests from various news media regarding reports about Msgr. Lucio Ángel Vallejo Balda.

In the first place, we are surprised and saddened by these reports.

The Prelature of Opus Dei has no information about this case. If the accusations turn out to be true, it will be particularly painful because of the harm done to the Church.

Msgr. Vallejo is a member of the Priestly Society of the Holy Cross, an association of priests intrinsically united to the Prelature. The Prelature has no right to intervene in the pastoral ministry nor in the assignments that members of the society carry out in their dioceses or in the Holy See. The mission of the Priestly Society is to accompany its members spiritually.

Msgr. Vallejo was called to work in Rome by the Holy See, in agreement with the bishop of his diocese (Astorga, Spain). The Prelature of Opus Dei was not involved in this decision nor did it know about it until it was made public. Msgr. Vallejo’s only superiors are the Holy See and the bishop of the diocese in which he is incardinated (Astorga).