The brand new pope, Leo XIV, has this in widespread with a lot of his friends within the Catholic hierarchy: He’s been in positions of authority when accusations of sexual abuse have arisen in opposition to clergymen below his supervision.
Now some advocates for victims say there must be an accounting of how Leo – the identify taken by Cardinal Robert Prevost upon his election Thursday – dealt with such circumstances when he held positions of church authority in Chicago and Peru. And so they hope that as pope, he’ll crack down on different bishops who they are saying are mishandling related circumstances.
“Some may advise giving the brand new pontiff the advantage of the doubt. We disagree. It’s on Pope Leo XIV to win the belief of victims and their households,” Anne Barrett Doyle of the advocacy group BishopAccountability.org mentioned in an announcement.
In its assertion, BishopAccountability.org contended that not like many dioceses and spiritual orders, Prevost by no means printed a listing of accused abusers below his supervision.
The group additionally contended that below his most up-to-date Vatican submit, Prevost maintained “secrecy” within the disciplinary course of for bishops. “Below his watch, no complicit bishop was stripped of his title,” it mentioned.
Some advocates, nevertheless, credit score Prevost with supporting survivors of an abusive, Peru-based Catholic motion that was ultimately dissolved by the late Pope Francis.
Prevost “stood with us when others didn’t. That’s why his election issues,” mentioned abuse survivor and journalist Predo Salinas, who helped discovered the group Ending Clergy Abuse.
Nobody has accused the pope of any act of abuse himself. Neither is he accused of what many Catholic bishops worldwide have performed – knowingly preserving confirmed abusers in public ministry – in what has been the defining scandal of the Catholic Church in latest a long time.
Moderately, he’s been accused of falling quick in his responses to circumstances in Chicago and Peru.
The Survivors Community of these Abused by Clergymen filed a proper grievance on March 25 in opposition to then-Cardinal Prevost with the Vatican secretary of state, alleging he abused ecclesiastical energy in his dealing with of two circumstances. The submitting amounted to a proper name for an investigation below guidelines established by Pope Francis in 2023 for coping with the hierarchy’s dealing with of abuse circumstances.
One case entails the time when Prevost was based mostly in Chicago because the Midwest regional chief of the Order of St. Augustine.
The case concerned James Ray, then a priest within the Archdiocese of Chicago. The archdiocese positioned him on restricted ministry in 1990 resulting from abuse allegations, in line with a later report by the Illinois legal professional normal’s workplace.
Bishops typically imposed such restrictions – with various ranges of enforcement and usually with out warning the general public – till the explosive sex-abuse scandal uncovered by the Boston Globe in 2002 within the Boston Archdiocese led to a nationwide coverage of automated elimination from ministry.
In line with the grievance, Ray – who was not an Augustinian – was allowed to dwell at an Augustinian friary in Chicago from 2000 to 2002.
The archdiocese, not the Augustinians, had final duty for Ray as one in all its clergymen, and there’s no indication that anybody had a authorized obligation to tell neighbors that an accused abuser lived amongst them. However the grievance alleges that Prevost was conscious of the association, citing a 2000 inside archdiocesan memo, and will have knowledgeable the college.
“By doing so, Cardinal Prevost endangered the protection of the kids,” the grievance mentioned.
Ray was moved out of the friary in 2002 and ultimately left the priesthood. Prevost grew to become worldwide chief of the Augustinians later that 12 months.
The opposite case entails Prevost’s tenure as bishop of Chiclayo, Peru.
In April 2022, three girls got here ahead to accuse two clergymen – Eleuterio Vásquez Gonzales and Ricardo Yesquen – of sexually abusing them starting in 2007, after they have been minors, in line with the grievance. The diocese, led by Prevost, forwarded details about the case to the Vatican workplace overseeing such complaints. It closed the case with no discovering, although the diocese later reopened the investigation in 2023 after Prevost left for a Vatican submit.
The grievance says the diocese suspended Gonzales from ministry pending investigation however that later pictures allegedly confirmed him persevering with to have fun Mass publicly. It mentioned the diocese reported that Yesquen was not in ministry resulting from his age and well being.
In line with the grievance, Prevost fell quick as a result of the diocese didn’t interview the ladies – depriving the Vatican investigators of doubtless very important info – and failed to supply assist to the accusers or to report the clergymen to civil authorities.
Bishop Edinson Farfán, Prevost’s successor in Chiclayo, defended his predecessor’s dealing with of the case, saying it’s necessary to be delicate to the alleged victims whereas additionally respecting the investigative course of.
The Vatican investigation mentioned Prevost acted accurately in imposing preliminary restrictions on Gonzales whereas Peruvian authorities carried out their very own civil investigation, the everyday manner the church handles allegations which are additionally being investigated by secular authorities.
9 days after Peruvian authorities closed the case as a result of the statute of limitations expired, Prevost was publicly named to take over the Vatican’s workplace for bishops, leaving the diocese. The Vatican’s dicastery for the doctrine of the religion finally shelved the case, citing an absence of enough proof to proceed with a canonical trial in opposition to Gonzales.
Some hoped Prevost’s intervention in a scandal involving the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, a Catholic motion in Peru, was an indication of reforms to come back. Salinas mentioned in an announcement that the brand new pope, then in his position as bishop of Chiclayo, performed a pivotal position in confronting the case, which is taken into account one of the egregious sex-abuse scandals in Latin America.
In a outstanding transfer, Pope Francis dissolved Sodalitium Christianae Vitae in January over alleged sexual and non secular abuses and monetary mismanagement.
“The world is ready,” mentioned Gemma Hickey, president of Ending Clergy Abuse. “Let this pope be remembered not for the worldwide abuse disaster he inherits, however for the way he ends it.”
In 2023, when he took the Vatican job of overseeing the collection of bishops, Prevost advised Vatican Information that there was progress in how some bishops have dealt with abuse however that extra work is required with “bishops who haven’t obtained the required preparation” to take care of it.
He added: “Silence is just not the answer. We have to be clear and sincere, we should accompany and help the victims, as a result of in any other case their wounds won’t ever heal.”
Francis had a blended file on responding to the clergy sexual abuse disaster. Most notably in 2018, he bungled a significant case in Chile earlier than reversing course, ordering an investigation and apologizing to the victims. Finally, it grew to become a turning level for the way he dealt with circumstances of clergymen sexually abusing youngsters for the remainder of his papacy.
