KOZHIKODE: Sister Lucy Kalappura of the Franciscan Clarist Congregation (FCC) has got an interim relief as the Munsif court in Mananthavady in Wayanad has stayed the FCC decision to expel her from the convent at Karakkamala under Mananthavady diocese. She was expelled in early August on the charge of failing to give a satisfactory reply for her lifestyle in violation of the rules. The court will consider the case again on January 1.
It was the 'Justice for Lucy' forum which approached the court praying to scrap the expulsion order. Though Sr Lucy has submitted three appeals against the same to the higher church in the Vatican, two have been dismissed. Lucy has said that FCC had even not appointed a commission to hear her version. "Though I had submitted the last appeal to the Supreme Tribunal of the Signatura Apostolica in October, they have not considered it yet. At the same time, I am repeatedly denied justice from the part of the church, I finally approached the court," Sister Lucy told.
Sr Lucy was ousted from the congregation for several ‘lifestyle violations’, which include learning to drive and owning a car despite being denied permission of the superior, publishing poems and supporting the protest of the nuns against rape-accused Bishop Franco Mulakkal.
She had recently published her autobiography, 'Karthavinte Namathil' (In the name of Christ), in which she recounts sexual abuses prevalent in convents. Sister Lucy claims in the book that many of the nuns have 'unholy' relationships with priests who are in authority and added that the priests encourage such relationships. She writes that she has heard of instances where priests have sexual relationships with nuns and homosexual relations as well.