VENICE – «Due seminarians, currently priests, told me they had suffered sexual harassment in the Seminary of Venice: I advised them to speak about it in the Patriarchate. Subsequently they told me that they had done so and that they had been listened to carefully: later, however, they let me know that they had been expelled from the Seminary».
The episode was reported yesterday by the former parish priest of San Zulian and San Salvador, Maximilian D’Antiga (reduced to the lay state by the Pope two years ago) answering questions from the defense during the second and last day of testimony in the trial against Enrico Di Giorgi, 76, a former Milanese manager at Montedison di Marghera, and Gianluca Buoninconti, 55 years old, computer technician from Milan, accused of being the “crows” authors of the numerous leaflets, signed “Brother”, posted between January and August 2019, which told stories of grabbing prelates and interested in sex, with a patriarch if not conniving, at least willing to turn a blind eye. In one of these leaflets the alleged sexual harassment inside the Venetian Seminary was denounced.
D’Antiga explained that some of the facts told in the flyers were known to him as they had been confided to him by some parishioners, whose names he did not want to name, however, in compliance with the secrecy of the confessional. He declared to the Tribunal that he had always advised them, evidence in hand, to contact the Patriarchate and the judiciary, but that he did not know if they had done so.

THE VICAR GENERAL
After the former parish priest, the vicar of the Diocese of Venice has risen to the witness stand, don Angelo Pagani (formed as a civil party in the trial as a victim of one of the defamatory leaflets), who reconstructed relations with D’Antiga, arguing that they had always been good, despite the fact that the Patriarchate had been forced to intervene to address some questions relating to the inheritance left to the parish priest, and to the rent of some premises.
D’Antiga’s move to San Marco, decided at the end of 2018, was not punitive, Pagan assured: it was part of a reorganization project of the San Marco area, which had been talked about for some time, with the appointment of a parish priest single. But D’Antiga reacted in an “unpleasant” way because he did not want to leave San Zulian, where he believed he should stay for life, as indicated by Padre Pio. The vicar general recounted that, initially, they tried to convince him to accept; then, after a controversial interview with the Gazzettino and the protests organized by the faithful who supported him, the Patriarchate decided to intervene “to avoid turmoil”, advising him to transfer to a monastery for three months, to recover serenity. The parish priest refused and, during a meeting with the Patriarch in December, he threatened revelations about immoral acts by members of the Venetian church. Behavior following which a proceeding for abuse of office and disobedience was opened, as well as for the curses pronounced, following which he was then reduced to the lay state.
The trial will continue on February 14. Among the witnesses is also the Patriarch Francesco Moraglia, among the victims of the “crow”.