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Chilean Abuse Crisis First Thing to Tackle for New Santiago Church Leader

By Ines San Martin
Crux
March 30, 2018

https://cruxnow.com/church-in-the-americas/2019/03/30/chilean-abuse-crisis-first-thing-to-tackle-for-new-santiago-church-leader/

A man holds a crucifix at the cathedral in Santiago, Chile, May 18, 2018. The Archdiocese of Santiago has recommended the former rector of the cathedral be removed from the clerical state after allegations of abuse and his remarks about the church. (Credit: CNS photo/Ivan Alvarado, Reuters.)

Bishop Celestino Aos, the temporary administrator of the Archdiocese of Santiago in Chile, has an uphill battle ahead of him.

On Thursday, his predecessor Cardinal Javier Errazuriz, went before a local prosecutor to testify as a defendant as part of an investigation into the country’s sprawling sex abuse and cover-up scandal.

A civil court just ordered the archdiocese to pay $450,000 to the survivors of the abuse of one priest, after allegedly covering up the crime; Aos has decided not to appeal.

In addition, he doesn’t have a completely clean track record himself when it comes to handling cases of clerical sexual abuse: When he was the promoter of justice in the diocese of Valparaiso, he allegedly mishandled abuse allegations presented by ex-seminarians against five priests in 2012. He single-handedly investigated the allegations against all of them in three months, and deemed the accusations not credible.

Today, one of the priests is out of the priesthood, and some of the others are being re-investigated.

Mauricio Pulgar, a victim of abuse in the seminary of Valparaiso, told Crux last Saturday that when he had to deal with Aos in 2012, the bishop’s treatment was “inhumane,” and claimed that the prelate helped Bishop Gonzalo Duarte cover up the misconduct.

Yet there are some who are open to giving Aos an opportunity to prove himself as a bishop.

Among them is Father Eugenio de la Fuente, who last year came to the Vatican to meet with Pope Francis as part of a group of eight men who were in one way or another hurt by former priest Fernando Karadima, the country’s most infamous abusive cleric.

“One can perceive an attitude that is completely different, he’s a simple man, capable of empathy, listening, hearing also things one doesn’t want to hear,” de la Fuente told Crux on Friday. “He has a sensibility capable of understanding the suffering and the pain that the Chilean Church has because of the abuse, he’s closer to the pain of the other person, and this is a reason for hope. His Capuchin formation is palpable,” the priest said.

Regarding the reservations that some have expressed due to Aos’s behavior in Valparaiso, de la Fuente said that what he did, the newly appointed bishop did under the command of Duarte, who was “quickly removed” from the diocese by Francis after Maltese Archbishop Charles Scicluna and Spanish Father Jordi Bertomeu investigated the local church at the pope’s request last year.

“He was tasked with looking into the cases in Valparaiso, but we don’t know what information he got from Duarte, nor the time frame,” the priest said. “I see Duarte as the person responsible for keeping the information hidden, impeding justice in the many cases of abuse that took place in the San Rafael seminary and in the diocese.”

Duarte is another of the nine Chilean bishops who have been called to testify, but in his case, there are also allegations of abuse of power and conscience with sexual connotations, as he allegedly forced seminarians to give him massages and kisses.

 

 

 

 

 




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