This week important steps have been taken in Europe in efforts to uncover pederasty in the Catholic Church. On one side, Benedict XVI apologized for the abuses of the clergy in Munich when he was archbishop. And, on the other hand, in Spain the Government proposed a commission led by the defender of minors, a cause that is added to several similar processes in other countries of the continent.
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“Spain and Italy have not yet faced this problem, unlike countries like France, Portugal, Ireland and the Netherlands, where there are already investigations, collaborations with the Government or even only the Church addresses it with an independent commission” explains Julio Núñez, one of the journalists from El País who has worked to uncover pederasty in the Spanish clergy, a topic that this newspaper has followed in recent years.
“The problem of pedophilia in the Catholic Church is global”says Miguel Hurtado, a victim of abuse in the Monserrat abbey in Barcelona, who promotes the creation of a Truth Commission of independent experts.
“This is not limited to certain European or Anglo-Saxon countries. It happens in all states where the Church has an important presence. The main difference is that in some where there are independent media outlets, or a more proactive civil justice system, crimes come to light. While in other cases, the power of the Catholic hierarchy intimidates the victims, civil society, journalists and justice. This is what still happens in Italy or in several Latin American countries”, he adds.
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Italy is at the bottom of Europe in terms of investigations into pederasty in the Church. So much so that the UN reproached her for her passivity and demanded that an investigation be opened, as has happened in other places.
One of them is France, where the Independent Commission on Abuses in the Catholic Church investigated the scourge since 1950 and concluded that at least 216,000 minors were victims of pederasty. “These numbers are overwhelming and cannot remain without consequences,” said Jean-Marc Sauvé, president of the Commission.
In Germany, the Episcopal Conference decided to investigate on their own. In 2018, it presented a report with 3,677 cases of abuse committed by 1,670 clerics over the last 70 years. The report concluded that priestly celibacy, the position against homosexuality and the sacrament of confession must be reviewed.
On the other hand, the Archdiocese of Munich exhibited evidence of 497 cases of abuse committed between 1945 and 2019. And, according to the investigation, Benedict XVI covered up four priests when he was archbishop between 1977 and 1982. The pope emeritus said this week he felt “deeply shame and pain”, but denies the accusation.
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In Belgium, the Parliament started an investigation and an arbitration center, while the Church created “contact points” to attend to the victims. There were 628 complaints before the arbitration center and 426 before the Church. 506 people received compensation from the former, and 349 from the latter: an average of 5,000 euros each.
One of the most prominent cases in handling the issue in Europe is that of the Austrian Church, which, driven by the scandals of the past decade, created a commission. Although most of the cases had already prescribed, he offered compensations and therapies. It is estimated that he has paid 27.5 million euros to 2,000 victims and almost 22 million euros in therapies.
As for Poland, the most recent investigation is from 2021 and in it the Church admits having received 368 complaints between 2018 and 2020.
In Ireland the scandals began in the 1980s and shocked a very Catholic society. Several investigations have been carried out, such as the Ferns and Murphy reports. But only a small percentage of named priests have been convicted. The last study, from 2021, clarified that 9,000 children died in foster homes of Catholic orders.
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In January of this year, an independent commission created by the Portuguese Episcopal Conference started to investigate the cases that have occurred since 1950 in the country. In the first five days they received 102 complaints. And its conclusions are expected to arrive in about a year.
Spain’s concern
In Spain, President Pedro Sánchez (socialist) promotes a bill for the Ombudsman, Ángel Gabilondo, to lead the investigation into pederasty in the clergy, with the support of the Church and an independent commission of experts.
At the same time, the United We Can, Esquerra Republicana and Bildu parties ask Congress for a commission to be in charge of the task. “Either of the two formulas sets foot on a problem that had not yet been addressed in Spain from the institutional sphere,” explains Núñez. “It is a step forward because the administration has begun to address this issue that until now had only been dealt with internally in the Church with great opacity and by the media,” she adds.
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For his part, Hurtado believes that an investigation such as the one proposed by the Government “can be incredibly useful or an image wash depending on how it is done.” The key is to be effective.
“It must have sufficient resources to find, take testimony and document the abuses committed against tens of thousands of victims in our country. It has to be transparent, organizing public hearings where the Catholic hierarchy is accountable for its managementand it must have broad powers of investigation, so that it can demand that the canonical archives with documentation on these cases be delivered to it, not only the abuses but also the systematic cover-up by the bishops, ”he assures.
Spain proposes that the Church participate, as is the case in other countries, although for now the Episcopal Conference has not ruled on whether it will collaborate or not.
Until now, the greatest boost in research on pedophilia in the Spanish Church has come from media such as El País, which has been publishing testimonies for years.
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comprehensive repair
The investigations must not only point out the guilty, but also focus on the victims, silenced by the leaders of the Church, due to personal fear and fear of social stigmatization.
“As a victim, I ask the State for an independent investigation that focuses on the sexual abuse committed by priests and the cover-up of the bishops, in which the iceberg of clerical pederasty emerges to find out how many pedophile priests and cover-up bishops there are,” he claims. Hurtado by demanding that “the victims receive moral and economic compensation. And mechanisms of non-repetition, such as the imprescriptibility of crimes of pederasty as it happens in Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Belgium, Holland or Switzerland”.
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Precisely avoiding repetition is another of the objectives sought. “For this, legal reforms are needed, but above all mental and cultural reforms,” says Hurtado. “There has been an excess of deference, an awe on the part of civil society, grassroots Catholics and institutions towards the power of the Catholic hierarchy,” he says.
Hurtado insists that action must be taken. “The Vatican and the bishops of the world have been expressing beautiful words of solidarity with the victims for decades, but have not taken action. The covering-up bishops must be stopped, the victims must be compensated, the cases of clerical pedophilia must be reported to justice or the canonical archives with the documentation on these crimes must be handed over.”
JUANITA SAMPER OSPINA
Correspondent of THE TIME
MADRID
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