ROME (CNS): Zambian Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo said he loved a Korean woman he married in May ‘as a sister’ and planned to meet her to explain his decision to reconcile with the Catholic Church.
Speaking on Italy’s main evening newscast on August 24 after two weeks out of public view, the archbishop accused officials of the movement of the Rev Sun Myung Moon, who performed the nuptials, of blocking his attempts to communicate with Maria Sung.
Archbishop Milingo, a 71 year-old former Vatican official, has been in seclusion for prayer and reflection following a surprise reconciliatory meeting on August 7 with Pope John Paul II.
Ms Sung, a 43 year-old acupuncturist who had rebuffed several Vatican attempts to deliver a letter to her from the archbishop, watched the broadcast on a huge screen with dozens of reporters in her Rome hotel, where she has been on a hunger strike.
Archbishop Milingo said he married Ms Sung in a mass wedding in a New York hotel on May 27 because he had felt lonely and misunderstood by the Catholic Church.
But then I realised I had committed a serious error, and I repented, and that’s why I asked the Holy Father to (allow me to) re-enter the Church,’ he said.
