A Fort Worth bishop in an ongoing legal and religious dispute with a monastery of nuns posted a video addressing the controversy this weekend, calling claims made in a lawsuit filed by the nuns "baseless and false."
Bishop Michael F. Olson of the Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth released the video Sunday in what he called an attempt to settle confusion about the dismissal of a nun accused of breaking her vow of chastity.
In the video, Olson said the dispute should be handled internally by the diocese.
"This is a church matter, this is a pastoral matter, this is a spiritual matter," Olson said in the video. "Others have attempted to draw me into addressing this matter in the inappropriate venues of civil court, and also in both social media and the mainstream media, and I will not do so."
Olson claims Rev. Mother Teresa Gerlach of the Discalced Carmelite Nuns of Arlington admitted on five different dates to breaking her vow consensually with a priest, with “clarity and consistency” to her story. During the first four admissions, made outside of the confessional booth, Olson said Gerlach declined to name the priest. Olson has not provided any evidence of the admissions, or of the alleged affair.
The lawsuit filed by Gerlach and the Carmelite nuns May 10 claims Olson invaded their privacy by visiting the secluded Monastery of the Most Holy Trinity with only minutes notice April 24, demanding Gerlach hand over her phone, computer and iPad, then accessing personal information off of them.
A May 3 affidavit described Gerlach as being in "extremely poor physical health.” It goes on to say she uses a catheter, a feeding tube and an IV drip. Gerlach claims she was asked to confess shortly after surgery.
On the alleged fifth admission, Olson said she named the priest with whom she broke her vow. Olson said this conversation took place the day before Gerlach’s surgery when she was not under the influence of anesthesia or any other medications.
When Gerlach’s phone was confiscated, Olson said she surrendered it “freely and calmly.” He emphasized that the phones are not the property of the sisters as a condition of their voluntary vow of poverty, and that the phone records were searched as a part of the investigation and returned under a mutually agreed-upon framework with Gerlach.
Matthew Bobo, attorney for the nuns, said that's not how it happened.
"There wasn't anything calm and peaceful about it," he said in an interview with KERA. "It was bully tactics — 'you have to do this, you don't have a choice.'"
Olson emphasized church leadership is not privy to the sisters’ personal communications on a regular basis. He called Gerlach’s legal council’s claims “baseless, ludicrous and not true.”
Since the investigation began, Olson said other people closely associated with the monastery came forward with evidence that the sisters were using illegal drugs. He said the information was immediately turned over to the Arlington Police Department.
In a June 8 statement, Bobo said the alleged photo evidence "could have easily been staged and doctored by anyone, and from anywhere." Olson called those claims “false and baseless.”
Olson concluded his video message by asking viewers to pray for a resolution to the dispute.
"Please play for all the nuns and novices in the Carmelite monastery, for their health and salvation," Olson said. "Please pray for me as your bishop, entrusted to minister and to oversee this personally painful and spiritually delicate matter in accord with the heart and mind of Jesus Christ."
