Kokx recently interviewed Peruvian priest Msgr. Ricardo Coronado-Arrascue. Coronado-Arrascue was defrocked by the Vatican under Pope Francis in 2024, but he has vigorously maintained that the ruling did not follow canon law procedures, and that it was a form of punishment to keep him silent about Pope Leo’s past while he was bishop of Chiclayo in Peru.
Coronado-Arrascue previously represented several young women from Peru who said they told Prevost when he was their bishop that they were abused by a priest named Fr. Eleuterio Vasquez when they were minors. They publicly said that Prevost failed to handle their complaints properly. Complicating the matter further, Vasquez, also known as “Lute,” was recently granted a dispensation from priestly duties by the Vatican. Coronado-Arrascue has said that the move was the equivalent of a get-out-of-jail-free card, and that it was likely a favor that Leo gave to his “old friend,” as he and Lute have known each other for many years.
During his most recent conversation with Kokx, Coronado-Arrascue said that he is a former member of the Augustinian Order in Peru. He said that he too too knows some of the men who attended the Pachamama ritual. He explained to Kokx that they support liberation theology and Marxist thinking.
Kokx’s report focuses on several of the clergy who attended the meeting. Some of them are still in active ministry in Peru, including Fuertes Prieto, who is the current Diocesan Administrator for the Apostolic Vicariate of Iquitos. Fr. John Lydon is perhaps the most well known cleric who attended the meeting.
Lydon is the former Secretary General of the Organization of the Augustinians of Latin America. In 1993, the organization approved a new “creed” that declared, “We believe in God Father and Mother of Life.” Lydon spoke about his vocation with the Augustinians in a video released last year.
Lydon is by far the closest of all the clergy who attended the 1995 gathering with Pope Leo. Not only did Lydon graduate with Leo from Villanova in 1977, he lived with him at the Augustinian order’s house of formation in Trujillo, Peru from 1990 until 1999. Lydon has also worked as the Director of the Mother Cabrini Institute on Immigration at Villanova, where he has pushed open-borders talking points.
Fr. John Lydon was attended as well. Lydon lived with Prevost at the Augustinian house in Trujillo, Peru from 1990 until 1999. He also served as the Secretary General of the Organization of Augustinians in Latin America, which approved in 1993 a creed that referred to God as… pic.twitter.com/xIuKLQsp9H
— Stephen Kokx (@StephenKokx) March 26, 2026
