The number of minors who have been victims of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy in Spain since 1940 is believed to exceed 200,000, according to a first independent report released this Friday, breaking the silence in a country where victims have faced years of the lack of transparency in the church.
“There were people who committed suicide (…), people who never managed to get their lives back on track”public defender Ángel Gabilondo said at a press conference, as he handed over the more than 700-page report titled “A Necessary Response” to the Spanish Congress, which commissioned it in March 2022.
The report does not give an exact number, but includes a survey involving 8,000 people, which shows that 0.6% of the Spanish adult population (about 39 million people in total) claim to have been victims of sexual abuse by members of the Catholic Church . Church when they were minors.
This figure rises to 1.13% of the adult population (the equivalent of over 400,000 victims), if abuses committed by lay people in religious settings are taken into account, explained Gabilondo, who coordinated the independent commission that worked for a year . .
Gabilondo, former Socialist Minister of Education, stated that there are cases dating back to the 1940s, but most occurred between 1970 and 1990.
This period runs from the beginning of the Franco dictatorship (1939-75), which had one of its pillars in the Church, to a period in which the democratic transition was already well established.
The expert committee interviewed 487 victims, who highlighted “the emotional problems” they suffered throughout their lives, Gabilondo reported.
“I will never be a normal person. I will never stop taking therapies or medications”one of the victims, Teresa Conde, told AFP, for whom the report is a “bright spot” that should prompt civil authorities to ensure “at least this doesn’t happen again.”
Now Teresa, a 57-year-old philosophy teacher, was abused for years by a monk who was a close friend of her family, starting at the age of 14, when she volunteered at a religious school in Salamanca in the early 1980s.
“Concealment”
Unlike France, Germany, Ireland, the United States or Australia, Spain, a traditionally Catholic country, had never conducted a survey of pedophilia among the clergy.
In France, 216 thousand underage victims have been registered since 1950; in Germany 3677 cases between 1946 and 2014; and in Ireland more than 14,500 people were compensated.
In the Spanish Catholic Church “For years there was an overriding desire to deny abuse (…), to hide or to protect abusers”denounced the public defender, who criticized the transfer of accused religious people to parishes in other countries.
The report calls for a number of recommendations “the creation of a state fund for the payment of compensation” victims and that they receive psychological help for as long as necessary.
The Catholic Church, which for years refused to participate in investigations, refused to participate in the commission, although it provided documents.
Consulted by AFP, the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) said it will take a position on the issue at an extraordinary meeting on Monday.
As political pressure mounted, the Church announced its own audit in February 2022 and commissioned it to a law firm, which plans to complete it before the end of the year.
The Church claims to have implemented action protocols against abuse and installed “small protection offices” in its dioceses.
A ‘slightly better’ country
“Today we are a slightly better country because a reality has become known that everyone knew about years ago, but no one talked about”celebrated from Brussels the leader of the Spanish government, the socialist Pedro Sánchez.
The publication of the document was widely celebrated by the 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 association Infância Roubada, told AFP.
Cuatrecasas, father of a young man abused by a teacher at a Catholic school in the Basque city of Bilbao between 2008 and 2010, says the report should not mark “an end” but “the beginning” of a process in which Congress must to work. to offer “reparations” to the victims.
“Victims do not ask for alms. They ask that, in a constitutional state, they be regarded as victims and that they are entitled to all the remedies and claims they ask for.”he emphasized.
Source: DN
