The Swiss Guard was shaken earlier by a gay controversy at the Vatican in 1998 when its commander Alois Estermann and his wife were shot dead by young guard Cédric Tornay, who later turned the gun on himself.Īccording to a book about the Vatican by British journalist John Follain, Tornay and Estermann had a homosexual affair.Įstermann subsequently had a relationship with another guard and refused to award a three-year service medal to Tornay, which led the guard to kill him, Follain maintains. 'We shouldn’t marginalize people for this,' he added.įrancis said that gay priests should be forgiven and their sins forgotten in a shift from his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI who ruled that gays should not be priests. 'If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?' the pope said. In November, current Pope Francis said at a news conference that he wouldn’t judge priests for their sexual orientation.
Intrigue: Alois Estermann, pictured, his wife and another member of the elite corps were found shot dead
