SANTIAGO (CHILE)
Crux
May 20, 2019
By Inés San Martín
Chile, a Latin American nation of 18 million people where the Catholic Church dominated society for centuries and was revered for decades as the main source of moral opposition to Pinochet, more recently has been home to what is arguably the single most intense clerical sexual abuse crisis anywhere in the world.
If you don’t know the story of what’s happened in Chile, it’s hard to appreciate just how massive, and painful, this crisis has been.
In May 2018, every Chilean bishop presented their resignation to Pope Francis, who so far has accepted 9, five of them from prelates who are under the age of 75, meaning they cannot claim the pope released them from their duties because they’re over the retirement age.
Many locals suspect they know why the pontiff yanked these bishops, including Gonzalo Duarte of Valparaiso, who’s long been accused of covering up crimes allegedly committed in his local seminary, and who’s been summoned by the prosecutor’s office to testify on those charges and also on charges that he abused his position, demanding massages, hugs and kisses from unwilling seminarians.
Just removing bishops, however, seems unlikely to satisfy Chileans scarred by the scandals.
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