the pope emeritus Benedict XVI He is once again in the eye of the storm for his behavior in cases of pedophilia. A report links him to the Cover-up of child abuse in Germany by a priest who had long been denounced for these events. Apparently Joseph Ratzinger this time will have to give explanations before the Justice.
But Ratzinger, the greatest exponent of Catholic conservatism, was not the only one involved in these events. They are too two other high-ranking religious who were aware of the case and did not report it to the courts: the Cardinal Reinhard Marx and its predecessor in arzobispado Friedrich Wetter.
The abuses occurred in the 1980s, its protagonist was the priest Peter Hullermann, and this case is part of the series of similar acts committed against other children between 1945 and 2019 in the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising.
The details of the events and the possible cover-up of who would later be Benedict XVI are contained in a report by the Munich law firm, Westpfahl Spilker Wastl (WSW), detailing how clerics they turned a blind eye to the rapes, allowing them to be repeated for decades.
The details of the case for which Benedict XVI is accused
According to history, in 1980 the vicar of North Rhine-Westphalia, Peter HullermannHe was accused of serious sexual abuse of minors. Upon finding out, his superiors transferred him to Bavaria, where he repeated his crimes.
in 1986 a court sentenced him to prison and the German Catholic Church moved him back to another Bavarian city. There he officiated as a priest for about 20 years and, according to reports, reoffended.
Finally, in 2010, under the pontificate of Benedict XVI, the pedophile priest was finally forced to retire, but that same year the first major revelations of pedophilia broke out in the German Catholic Church.
Vicar General Gerhard Gruber took responsibility, saying in 2010 that Ratzinger, already pope, had no knowledge of Hullermann’s past. But that is something that remains to be seen.
The explanations of the accused Pope
As it turned out, Benedict XVI, who is 94 years old and has lived in seclusion in the Vatican since his resignation in 2013, sent the lawyers an 82-page document on the subject, the content of which is eagerly awaited.
“An admission by Ratzinger of having been personally and through his position complicit in the suffering of many young people (…) it would be a necessary sign of humility, as well as an example for many bishops and leaders”, considers the reforming group of laity and theologians “Wir sind Kirche”.
The Munich investigation marks a new chapter in clarifying the acts of pedophilia that affect the Catholic Church throughout the world.
Four years ago, a report revealed that at least 3,677 children had been sexually abused since 1946 by more than a thousand German clerics and that most of this was never sanctioned.
Shortly after taking office, the pope Pope Francis formally apologized on behalf of the church and in some reported and proven cases, it set compensation of up to 50,000 euros, a sum considered insufficient by the victims.