Marcial Maciel Degollado LC (March 10, 1920 – January 30, 2008) was a Mexican Catholic priest who founded the Legion of Christ and the Regnum Christi movement.

[1] Late in his life, Maciel was revealed to have been a longtime drug addict who sexually abused many boys and young men in his care.

[2][3] In 2006, Pope Benedict XVI removed Maciel from active ministry, based on the results of an investigation by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in April 2005.

On March 25, 2010, a communiqué on the Legion's website acknowledged as factual the "reprehensible actions" by Maciel, including sexual abuse of minor seminarians.

He sent the boy to work in the sugar fields to toughen him up, and years later Maciel told one of his own victims that mule drivers on his father's ranch had sexually abused him.

Father Orozco, who was among the original group of boys to found the Legion of Christ in 1941, said he heard the women had complained about the "noise" Maciel was making with children he had brought into his home to teach religion.

[9]Maciel was expelled from two seminaries for reasons that have never been revealed, and became a priest only after one of his bishop uncles ordained him after private studies,[10] on November 26, 1944, in Mexico City.

A 1956 draft of the memo describes a measure originally requiring Maciel to cease any contact with his students and attend treatment for his morphine addiction, or be suspended a divinis.

By October 2, 1956, the measure was edited to remove the prohibition against contact with seminarians, and later documents say further action against Maciel was superseded by "recommendations and interventions by high-ranking personalities".

[15] Jason Berry reports that early in his career, only two years into being a priest, Maciel visited the Vatican in 1946 to donate $10,000 from "several of Mexico's wealthiest families and its president, Miguel Aleman Valdes", appealing for support for scholarships for seminarians to study in Spain.

Another benefactor was Josefita Pérez Jiménez, the daughter of a former Venezuelan dictator, who provided largesse for a seminary in Salamanca, Spain built in 1958 by Maciel.

The highest level of membership in Maciel's Regnum Christi group, lay celibates, "live in communities and work relentlessly on fundraising".

"[8] In 1989, Juan Vaca tried again, sending "a long, detailed letter" to John Paul "in a dossier ... via Vatican diplomatic pouch, again including his original statement naming Maciel's victims".

They were told the following year that the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, then headed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI), was not moving forward with a direct prosecution.

American Roman Catholic luminaries came to the defense of Maciel and the Legion: William Donohue of the Catholic League called the men's claims "balderdash"; Father Richard John Neuhaus of First Things magazine called the charges false with "a moral certainty"; other defenders included John Paul II biographer and NBC Vatican analyst George Weigel; William Bennett, a former Reagan Education secretary; Mary Ann Glendon, a Harvard Law professor.

[23] In 1959 Maciel published a book, El salterio de mis días (The Psalter of My Days), which was widely read among members of the Legion and partially translated into English.

[24] Although the Legion's memorandum described Maciel's book as "a slight rewriting", a Spanish legionary familiar with it stated that it copied Lucia's memoir "80 percent in style and content.

He completed it in 1941 while a political prisoner of the Francoist Spanish State; it was published posthumously in Spain in 1956; that edition is believed to have been used by Maciel as the basis of his own book.

A few days before John Paul II died, Cardinal Ratzinger announced his intention of removing "filth" from the Church; many believed he was referring specifically to Maciel.

In May 2006, Ratzinger, now as Pope Benedict XVI, disciplined him: the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith ordered Maciel to live "a reserved life of penitence and prayer, relinquishing any form of public ministry",[27] and published a press communique to that effect.

[32] Former Vatican Secretary of State Angelo Sodano was accused of leading the effort to shield Maciel and other sexually abusive Legion of Christ clergy.

[33][34][35] Investigative journalist Jason Berry wrote in an April 2010 article in the National Catholic Reporter that the "charismatic" founder of the Legion of Christ "sent streams of money to Roman curia officials with a calculated end.

[38] Five bishops from five different countries, working independently of each other,[39] conducted an extensive investigation which took them to nearly every one of the religious order's houses[40] and on March 15, 2010, submitted their report to the Vatican.

In its statement the Vatican denounced Maciel for having created a system of power that enabled him to lead an "immoral" double life "devoid of scruples and authentic religious meaning.

The "very serious and objectively immoral acts" of Maciel, which were "confirmed by incontrovertible testimonies", represented "true crimes and manifest a life without scruples or authentic religious sentiment", the Vatican said.

[40] The Vatican also stated that the Legion created a "mechanism of defense" around Maciel to shield him from accusations and suppress damaging witnesses from reporting abuse.

[43] The Vatican acknowledged the "hardships" faced by Maciel's accusers through the years when they were ostracized or ridiculed, and commended their "courage and perseverance to demand the truth.