IMAGE: CNS photo/Paul Haring
By Junno Arocho Esteves
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis will meet with five priests who suffered
abuse by Chilean Father Fernando Karadima or his followers, the Vatican said.
The pope will meet June 1-3 with “five priests who were
victims of abuses of power, of conscience and sexual abuse,” the Vatican
said in a statement May 22.
Two
priests who have accompanied the survivors “in their juridical and
spiritual journey” and “two laypeople involved in this
suffering” also were
invited by Pope Francis, the
statement said. They will all be guests at the Domus Sanctae Marthae,
the Vatican residence where Pope Francis lives.
The pope will celebrate a private Mass with the group June 2
and will meet with members of the group together
and individually, the statement said. In late April, Pope Francis had hosted three laymen who
were sexually abused by Father Karadima.
“With this new meeting, planned a month ago, Pope
Francis wants to show his closeness to abused priests, accompany them in their
pain and listen to their valuable opinion to improve the current preventative
measures and the fight against abuses in the church,” the statement said.
The
day after the Vatican’s announcement, three Chilean priests who will take part
in the meeting read a statement on behalf of all nine, confirming their
participation in the meetings with Pope Francis.
At
a May 23 news conference in Santiago, Chilean Fathers Francisco Astaburuaga
Ossa, Alejandro Vial Amunategui and Eugenio de la Fuente Lora thanked the pope
for his invitation, which they said they hope would “re-establish justice
and communion, particularly within our Archdiocese of Santiago and its
presbyteries.”
The
statement was signed by the three priests, as well as Fathers Javier Barros Bascunan
and Sergio Cobo Montalva.
The
four other members of the group, the statement said, wished to remain
anonymous.
They
also expressed the “hope that our experience may give a voice to many
others who have suffered abuses or have accompanied abused persons.”
The
Chilean priests also asked journalists to respect the “confidentiality and
the privacy” of the meetings and that there will be “no more public
statements until our return to Santiago.”
The Vatican said the priests were abused by Father Karadima
and his followers in the parish of Sagrado Corazon de Providencia, also known
as the community of “El Bosque” (“The Forest”).
Known as an influential and charismatic priest, Father
Karadima founded a Catholic Action group in the wealthy Santiago parish and
drew hundreds of young men to the priesthood. Four of Father Karadima’s proteges went
on to become bishops, including Bishop Juan Barros of Osorno.
However, several former seminarians of “El Bosque”
revealed in 2010 that the Chilean priest sexually abused them and other members
of the parish community for years. One year later, Father Karadima was
sentenced by the Vatican to a life of prayer and penance after he was found
guilty of sexual abuse.
Chilean survivors have also alleged that Bishop Barros —
then a priest — as well as other members of Father Karadima’s inner circle had
witnessed their abuse by his mentor.
The pope, who initially defended his 2015 appointment of
Bishop Barros as head of the Diocese of Osorno, apologized after receiving a
2,300-page report from Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta.
In a letter released April 11, Pope Francis said he had been
mistaken in his assessment of the situation in Chile, and he begged the
forgiveness of the survivors and others he offended. He invited three survivors
— Juan Carlos Cruz, James Hamilton and Jose Andres Murillo — to Rome in late April and called all
of the Chilean bishops to the Vatican for meetings May 15-17.
In a document leaked by Chilean news channel Tele 13 before the meeting with the
bishops, Pope Francis said he was concerned by reports regarding
“the attitude with which some of you bishops have reacted in the face of
present and past events.”
The document’s footnotes included several details from the
investigation made by Archbishop Scicluna, which confirmed that, in some
instances, the bishops deemed accusations of abuse as “implausible.”
But Pope Francis said he was “perplexed and
ashamed” after he received confirmation that undue pressure by church
officials was placed on “those who carry out criminal proceedings”
and that church officials had destroyed compromising documents.
Those actions, he said, “give evidence to an absolute
lack of respect for the canonical procedure and, even more so, are
reprehensible practices that must be avoided in the future.”
After the three-day meeting, most of the Chilean bishops
offered their resignations to the pope.
Back in Chile, bishops — including Bishop Alejandro Goic of Rancagua, president of
the Chilean bishops’ commission for abuse prevention — continue to face
a backlash over
their handling of cases of abuse.
Bishop
Goic suspended 14 of the diocese’s 68 priests May 19 after an
investigative report by Tele 13 alleged there was a sex-abuse ring made up of clergy and known as “La
Cofradia” (“The Brotherhood”).
According to the report, “La Cofradia” had its own
hierarchical
structure and carried out, as well as covered up, the sexual abuse of minors by
members of the
group.
The report also alleged that although Bishop Goic was informed and presented
with evidence of the group’s existence by Elsa Fernandez, a local youth
minister, he refused to act.
Fernandez said
she contacted the Chilean bishops’ conference in January to inform them of the abuses
committed by “La Cofradia.” However, she said, she was informed in an email that the
conference “does not formally receive complaints.”
In an
interview published on the Tele 13 website May 22, Bishop Goic said he had thought
people talking about “La Cofradia” were speaking “in jest”
and said he “never received a formal complaint that seriously said this
was happening.”
After the report’s broadcast, Bishop Goic acknowledged that
he had met with
Fernandez, and he apologized
for his failure to act “with the appropriate agility in the
investigation” of the
priests allegedly involved
in the sex abuse ring.
“I must admit that personally, as a Christian and a
pastor, I find myself very affected by this difficult situation that hurts and
embarrasses me,” the bishop said. “I pray that the truth, the whole
truth, may come to light in these cases and in any other situations that threaten
the Gospel of Christ’s love.”
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