CHILE
ABC News
By LUIS ANDRES HENAO, ASSOCIATED PRESS
SANTIAGO, Chile — Nov 13, 2015
A bishop who has been defended by Pope Francis from critics who accuse him of covering up for Chile’s most infamous pedophile priest said Friday that he had no knowledge of the man’s sex abuse of young boys.
Bishop Juan Barros also said he didn’t help the Rev. Fernando Karadima get a trip to France as the priest testified in court this week. Karadima said that Barros helped him get the trip for the 50th anniversary of his priesthood and that he had a “very sincere friendship” with the bishop.
“I had nothing to do with the trip. I only helped him to enroll to officiate Mass at the Lourdes grotto,” Barro said about the Catholic shrine in France.
He also denied knowing about Karadima’s crimes. “I participated in the (El Bosque) parish for years, but as I’ve said before, just because I participated, it doesn’t mean I was witness to everything that happened there,” Barros said.
Karadima led the parish of El Bosque in Santiago for nearly six decades before the abuse allegations came to light in April 2010. Two months later, the then archbishop of Santiago, Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz, forwarded the allegations to the Vatican amid an eruption of abuse cases globally.
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