The PCP defended this Monday that it is possible for the Catholic Church to take “preventive and administrative measures” that allow the removal of “the suspected abusers” from public life, until “judicial and canonical conclusions”.
In a note to the press, the party believes that “given the magnitude of the problem and existing expectations, the known conclusions of the Episcopal Conference on the work of the Independent Commission do not correspond to the seriousness of the situation”.
“As many Catholics and even priests have said, it is possible for the Catholic Church, while respecting its independence, to adopt preventive and administrative measures in its functioning which, to judicial and canonical conclusions, make it possible to exclude alleged abusers from the public space.” life and the inevitable social alarm it would cause,” they argue.
This, they point out, “regardless of the judicial decisions imposed by the situation”.
The Independent Commission for the Study of Child Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church validated 512 testimonies, which, by extrapolation, pointed to at least 4,815 victims. Twenty-five cases were forwarded to the Public Prosecution Service, which opened 15 investigations, of which nine were closed.
These testimonies cover cases that occurred between 1950 and 2022, the period covered by the commission’s work.
The commission presented to the Portuguese Episcopal Conference a list of alleged abusers, some of them active, which sent the decision to remove priests suspected of abuse to the dioceses and rejected the award of compensation to the victims.
On Sunday, Lisbon’s Cardinal Patriarch Manuel Clemente lifted the suspension of alleged priests abusing minors without “proven facts, subject to contradiction” and a canonical process conducted by the Holy See.
Psychiatrist Daniel Sampaio denied today that the church had received a list of the names of abusive priests without more information on the reported cases, describing the bishops’ position as “slowing down the issue.”
“It’s not true that it’s just a list of names,” said the member of the Independent Commission for the Study of Child Sexual Abuse in the Portuguese Catholic Church, clarifying: “The list was obtained from victims’ complaints – in which the victim X says she was abused by priest Y — and the resulting investigation by the Historical Investigation Group with the records. And the list that was provided comes from the combination of the two,” he said in statements to Lusa .
Source: DN
