(PERU)
The Pillar [Washington DC]
August 12, 2025
By Edgar Beltrán
The Vatican has commissioned an investigation into allegations of coverup and financial misconduct made against Cardinal Carlos Castillo, archbishop of Lima, according to senior archdiocesan sources in Peru.
Investigators have in recent weeks summoned priests and archdiocesan employees to answer questions about the financial situation of Caritas Lima, a network of diocesan schools, and multiple alleged coverups of sexual misconduct — including cases previously reported by The Pillar, among them sexual misconduct claims linked to the archdiocesan seminary.
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Senior archdiocesan sources told The Pillar that a group of Augustinian priests led by Fr. Alexander Lam, OSA, his order’s assistant general for Latin American, had been interviewing clerics and archdiocesan employees virtually about allegations of abuse coverup and financial misconduct by Cardinal Carlos Castillo.
The virtual interviews were ahead of an in-person visit to Lima, with Lam set to arrive in Peru’s capital on Monday, sources said.
While the inquiry has not been described as an apostolic visitation, several sources told The Pillar that the investigators have said they are acting on behalf of the pope.
“The Vatican had asked the archdiocese a couple of months ago for reports about some of these allegations, and the archdiocese slow-walked them, so that’s when the pope decided to send these people to investigate,” a diocesan source told The Pillar.
Neither Fr. Lam nor the Archdiocese of Lima have responded to requests for comment.
But according to several sources in Lima, the investigation is centered mainly on financial irregularities and allegations clerical sexual misconduct.
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Several diocesan sources told The Pillar that the financial probe has focused on the situation of Caritas Lima, the archdiocesan social service agency.
“Before Castillo arrived, Caritas had five employees, it now has over 30, but the projects are the same, and some have even been abandoned. A former director of Caritas was fired after it was proven that his family member was selling Caritas donations — supplies like oxygen valves — on Facebook Marketplace,” a source close to Caritas Lima told The Pillar.
“Several projects have been abandoned by Caritas in recent years, baby cribs that have been lost, soup kitchens that closed, two clinics run by Caritas closed, social projects in the poorest neighborhoods of the archdiocese that have been reduced and much more,” the source added.
The Pillar obtained the 2023 budget of Caritas Lima, which shows that more than 75% of the institution’s expenses are salaries, a figure much higher for social service agencies than is generally recommended by international best practices. But senior sources told The Pillar that the salary-to-budget ratio has grown exponentially in recent years.
“Before Castillo, Caritas functioned with five or six employees and a large network of volunteers and partners — salaries were a meager part of the total expenses but there were more projects and many of them were better funded,” a senior archdiocesan source told The Pillar.
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According to Lima sources, the inquiry is also focused on various cases of clerical abuse and sexual misconduct which were allegedly mishandled by Castillo, including those in the archdiocesan seminary.
As reported by The Pillar, Castillo appointed in 2020 Fr. Luis Sarmiento as rector of the archdiocesan seminary, despite the fact that he had in 2018 been dismissed as a formator, because of a pattern of inappropriate behavior with seminarians.
A senior diocesan source told The Pillar: “The kind of behavior he engaged in then was not explicitly sexual, but he had very strange relationships with some seminarians and issues with personal boundaries, so it was decided he should leave the seminary.”
About a year after his 2020 return to the seminary as rector, Sarmiento was accused of sexual misconduct by a number of seminarians.
A former seminarian described Sarmiento as being “very touchy-feely,” giving big hugs to seminarians in which it was apparent that he was sexually aroused.
“It happened to me and I saw when it happened to others,” said the former seminarian, who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation.
As time passed, the number of allegations against Sarmiento grew.
“There were two instances in which Sarmiento tried to kiss seminarians,” a seminary source alleged. “In one, he went to a seminarian’s bedroom to talk with him, hugged him tightly and started smelling him, and tried to kiss him while [he was sexually aroused].”
“The second time, it was a propaedeutic seminarian that was sick, and Sarmiento visited in his bedroom, tried to kiss him, and the seminarian started yelling at him. A few weeks later, the seminarian was dismissed from the propaedeutic seminary.”
Instead of opening a canonical investigation against the rector, Castillo opted to dismiss the seminarians who came forward with the allegations, keeping Sarmiento in his post until 2023.
During Sarmiento’s tenure, the seminary’s enrollment fell from around 60 seminarians to 15.
According to senior diocesan sources, the inquiry has also examined abuse allegations against Fr. Santiago Caballero, a Lima priest.
“Caballero has had at least 10 allegations against him for abuse of minors and he has been protected by Castillo, so the investigators are asking about him,” a source close to the investigation told The Pillar.
According to another senior diocesan source, then-Archbishop of Lima, Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani, suspended Caballero in 2014 after an investigation due to abuse allegations against him.
“A few months before Cipriani left, Caballero was allowed to celebrate Mass privately in a convent but did not have any parish assignment. When Castillo became the archbishop, he fully reinstated him and allowed him to celebrate Mass in various parishes, and there have been more allegations of sexual misconduct since,” another source told The Pillar.
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The Pillar broke the news in June that the Archdiocese of Lima was accused of mishandling an investigation into Fr. Nilton Zárate Rengifo, who was accused of harassing a religious sister, solicitation in the confessional, and attempted absolution of an accomplice in a sexual sin, but had not been subject to a formal canonical process.
After the allegations against Zárate broke, the priest sent a letter to Castillo formally requesting his dismissal from the clerical state.
Senior diocesan sources said the dysfunction in investigating abuse cases had led to a rapid turnover at the judicial vicariate of Lima, with several employees and judges of the diocesan tribunal being fired in recent weeks, including Fr. Edwin Limas, who served as the notary in the interrogation of the sister during the brief canonical investigation against Zárate.