2023-10-28 00:36:08
An independent report revealed that in Spain there were more than 200,000 minors who were victims of sexual abuse by Catholic religious. The figure includes cases from 1940 to the present.
The information released this Friday shook Spanish society, that for decades kept the complainants in confrontation with the ecclesiastical leadership.
“There are people who have committed suicide, people who have never put their lives back together”said at a press conference the Ombudsman, Ángel Gabilondo, who delivered the report of more than 700 pages, titled “A necessary response”, to the Spanish Congress, which had entrusted it to it in March 2022.
Although it was clarified that the report does not offer an exact figure, if it includes a survey carried out with a sample of 8,000 people, according to which 0.6% of the Spanish adult population (about 39 million people in total) claim to have suffered sexual abuse by members of the Catholic Church when they were minors.
This figure increases to 1.13% if the adult population is analyzed (equivalent to more than 400,000 victims) if the abuses committed by lay people in religious settings are included, specified Gabilondo, who coordinated the independent commission that worked for a year and a half.
A former socialist Minister of Education pointed out that there are cases that date back to the 1940s.but what the vast majority occurred between 1970 and 1990. An era that spans from the beginning of the Franco dictatorship (1939-75), which had the Church as one of its pillars, to a period with the democratic transition already well established.
The commission of experts interviewed 487 victims, who stressed “the emotional problems” that they suffered throughout their lives. «I will never be a normal person. “I will never stop doing therapy or taking medication.”a victim, Teresa Conde, told AFP, for whom the report is a “light” that should lead civil authorities to guarantee “that at least this is not repeated.”
Now a 57-year-old philosophy professor, Conde was abused for years by a friar who was a close friend of her family.from the age of 14, in a religious school in Salamanca (northwest) where she went as a volunteer, in the early 1980s.
They claim that more than 200,000 minors suffered Catholic religious abuse in Spain: “Concealment”
Unlike France, Germany, Ireland, the United States or Australia, Spain, a country with a deep-rooted Catholic tradition, had never carried out an investigation into pedophilia in the clergy.
In France, 216,000 minor victims have been recorded since 1950, in Germany 3,677 cases between 1946 and 2014 and in Ireland more than 14,500 people received financial compensation.
In the Spanish Catholic Church «“For many years, a certain desire to deny abuse, conceal or protect abusers has predominated,” they denounced.
The report recommends “the creation of a state fund to pay compensation” to victims and ensure that they are provided with psychological care for as long as necessary.
The Catholic Church, which for years flatly refused any exhaustive investigation, declined to participate in the commission, although it finally provided documents.
When consulted, the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) indicated that it will take a position on Monday in an extraordinary assembly. Faced with increasing political pressure, the Church announced its own audit in February 2022, which a law firm plans to complete before the end of the year.
The Church claims to have implemented action protocols against abuse and installed “minor protection” offices in its dioceses.
They claim that more than 200,000 minors suffered Catholic religious abuse in Spain: A “a little better” country
“Today we are a slightly better country because a reality has been made known that everyone has known for many years, but of which no one talked,” the president of the Spanish government, the socialist Pedro Sánchez, congratulated from Brussels.
The publication of the report was welcomed by many victims. «“It is a serious report, which responds to the demands of the victims,” who had a “voice” in its preparation, Juan Cuatrecasas, founding member of the Stolen Childhood association, told AFP.
Father of a young man abused by a teacher at a Catholic school between 2008 and 2010 in the Basque city of Bilbao, Cuatrecasas indicated that the report should not mark “an end” but “the beginning.” of a process in which Congress legislates to provide reparations to victims.
The “victims do not ask for alms, “They ask that in a rule of law they be considered victims and that they have the right to all the resources and demands they request.”he highlighted.
(AFP)
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