Pope Francis has officially expelled two retired Chilean bishops from the Catholic Church for their alleged part in child sexual abuse within the country.
The expulsion which is one of the harshest punishments handed out by the church comes as Pope Francis aims to address the ongoing cases of historical child sex abuse within the Catholic Church.
In a statement released today, the Vatican said that both bishops Francisco Jos Cox Huneeus, archbishop emeritus of the city of La Serena, and Marco Antonio Órdenes Fernndez, archbishop emeritus of Iquique have been “reduced to lay state.”
The latest defrockings comes less than a month after Pope Francis defrocked another Chilean priest named Fernando Karadima, after he was accused of molesting a number of teenage boys over a extensive period of time.