Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne

Juan Luis Cipriani Thorne, a priest of Opus Dei, was only 44 years old in 1988 when Pope John Paul II elevated him to the bishopric, assigning him to be an auxiliary bishop of the Ayachuco o Huamanga archdiocese. Cipriani was promoted to archbishop of Ayachucho in 1995 and served just four years before JP II tapped him to become archbishop of Lima. He was elevated to cardinal in 2001, and continued to head the Lima archdiocese until January 2019, when Pope Francis accepted his resignation soon after the cardinal’s 75th birthday.

On January 24, 2025, El País reported that Pope Francis had compelled Cipriani to step down as Lima archbishop soon after the cardinal’s 75th birthday because of Cipriani’s alleged abuse of a minor. In 2018, a man had written a letter to the Pope saying that in 1983, when he was ages 16 and 17, he had been groped, caressed and kissed by then-Father Cipriani. According to the victim, Cipriani was his confessor, and the abuses took place during confession. In response to the El País report, the Vatican spokesman Matteo Brunei confirmed the sanctions against the cardinal. Bruni said that following the cardinal’s 2019 resignation, he had received “a penal injunction with specific disciplinary measures related to public activity, place of residence and the use of insignia.” The cardinal “signed and accepted” the measure, Bruni said, adding that the restrictions remained in place.