The Mexican founder of an ultra-conservative Roman Catholic order has resigned after 63 years as its leader just as the Vatican is opening an investigation into allegations he sexually abused former members.
Marcial Maciel, 84, who was warmly praised by Pope John Paul II on the 60th anniversary of his ordination in November, stepped down as leader of the Rome-based Legion of Christ last week, citing his age, according to the group's web site on Monday.
He will be replaced by another Mexican priest, 47-year-old Alvaro Corcuera, rector of the Legion Seminary in Rome and a consultant to the Vatican's Congregation for Bishops.
The resignation came a few weeks after Vatican prosecutor Martha Wegan said she would look into the case of a group of former Legionaries of Christ who accused Maciel in 1997 of sexually abusing them decades ago when they were teenagers.
The Legion, on a link to its Web site, says the charges were untrue, and the pope has consistently supported and praised Maciel.
News that the Vatican will examine the allegations, after remaining silent for the past six years, came as a surprise, said Jose Barba, one of Maciel's accusers and a professor at Mexico's Autonomous Technological Institute, or ITAM.
"We are not happy, we feel sad. These things never should have happened," Barba, 68, told Reuters.
"But we don't want to accept the silence that was imposed on us for decades. We believe it's important society knows the truth. This time, if they want, they have the opportunity to do something about it," he said.
Maciel has repeatedly denied the charges. In 2002 he said: "I never engaged in the sort of repulsive behavior these men accuse me of."
The religious order he founded in 1941 has around 500 priests and 2,500 seminarians in some 20 countries including Spain and the United States. Pupils take chastity, poverty and obedience vows and must pledge not to criticize their superiors and to inform on any dissent within the order.
Maciel's accusers have described their seminary life as a "brainwashing experience" with Maciel portrayed as a saint.
DOUBT OVER VALUE OF PROBE
The nine now elderly men went to the media with sex abuse allegations in 1997 after the Vatican -- which values the Legion as a zealous order good at attracting new recruits to Catholicism -- ignored them. Barba says he was abused by Maciel while he was training to be a priest in Rome, aged 17.
The claims, relating to events in the 1940s-1960s, came too late for authorities to pursue a criminal case.
Despite a flurry of media attention and books, the church in Mexico also refused to investigate Maciel, one of the most senior Catholic priests to be accused of sexual abuse.
Newspapers have not dropped the story, however, and Vatican-approved canon lawyer Wegan wrote to the former Legion members on December 2 saying she was reopening the case.
Religion professor Elio Masferrer at Mexico's National School of Anthropology and History questioned whether the investigation would be impartial and if it had not come too late given Maciel's age.
"I'm not very confident because we are not talking about a transparent investigation process. What the Vatican doesn't like stays secret," Masferrer said.
"The Catholic church uses the hypothesis that its prestige is worth more than abuse victims. It's a game of never reaching any conclusions but being able to say they did something."