{"id":16077,"date":"2025-10-17T19:13:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-18T01:13:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/vatican-report-calls-for-reparations-for-sex-abuse-victims\/"},"modified":"2026-03-25T19:35:57","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T19:35:57","slug":"vatican-report-calls-for-reparations-for-sex-abuse-victims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/vatican-report-calls-for-reparations-for-sex-abuse-victims\/","title":{"rendered":"Vatican report calls for reparations for sex abuse victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Pope
Pope Leo XIV presides over a Rosary vigil for peace in St. Peter's Square on the 63rd anniversary of the start of the Second Vatican Council, at the Vatican on Oct. 12. (Gregorio Borgia\/The Associated Press)<\/span>Gregorio Borgia<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

VATICAN CITY \u2013 The Vatican\u2019s child protection board said Thursday the Catholic Church has a moral obligation to help victims of clergy sexual abuse heal. It said financial reparations for the abused and tougher sanctions for abusers and their enablers are essential remedies.<\/p>\n

The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors focused on reparations in its second annual report \u2013 an often sensitive topic for the church, given the financial, reputational and legal implications.<\/p>\n

The report was significant: an official Vatican publication prepared with input from 40 abuse survivors worldwide. It gave voice to their complaints about how poorly the church handled their cases and highlighted measures they say are needed to heal.<\/p>\n

It contained the shocking revelation that the Vatican office responsible for one-third of the world\u2019s Catholic dioceses had received only a \u201csmall number of cases,\u201d and just two reports of bishops who covered up child sex crimes. The data suggests clergy abuse is going unchecked and unreported in vast parts of the developing world, more than three decades after the scandal first exploded publicly in the West.<\/p>\n

Pope Leo signals commitment to commission<\/div>\n

The report covers 2024, a period before Pope Leo XIV was elected. History\u2019s first American pope has acknowledged that the abuse scandal remains a \u201ccrisis\u201d for the church.<\/p>\n

Leo has signaled a commitment to the commission, which Pope Francis created in 2014 to advise the church on best practices to prevent abuse.<\/p>\n

The report said monetary settlements are necessary to provide victims with therapy and other assistance to help them recover from the trauma.<\/p>\n

But it said the church owes a far greater debt to victims, the broader church community and God. The hierarchy must listen to victims and provide spiritual and pastoral assistance. Church leaders must apologize for the harm done, explain what they are doing to punish offenders and outline measures to prevent future abuse, the report said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe church bears a moral and spiritual obligation to heal the deep wounds inflicted from sexual violence perpetrated, enabled, mishandled, or covered up by anyone holding a position of authority in the church,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

The report was prepared with victims in focus group settings, where they listed priorities for healing. They identified the need for accountability from church leaders, information about their cases, and true reform of church structures to adequately punish abusers and enablers.<\/p>\n

A legal process that retraumatizes<\/div>\n

Significantly, the 2024 report said the church\u2019s handling of abuse cases \u2013 and its \u201cdecades-long pattern of mishandling reports, including abandoning, ignoring, shaming, blaming, and stigmatizing\u201d victims \u2013 is itself retraumatizing.<\/p>\n

It referred to the church\u2019s dysfunctional in-house canonical code, where cases can take years to process and the most severe punishment for a serial rapist priest may be dismissal.<\/p>\n

The process is cloaked in secrecy, leaving victims with no rights to information about their case beyond its outcome.<\/p>\n

The report called for sanctions that are \u201ctangible and commensurate with the severity of the crime.\u201d While laicization is possible for priests who rape children, the church frequently imposes lesser penalties, such as a period of retreat from active ministry.<\/p>\n

Even when a bishop is removed for mishandling cases, the public is often told only that he has retired. The report urged the church to \u201cclearly communicate reasons for resignation or removal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Audit of countries and Vatican office<\/p>\n

Anne Barrett Doyle of BishopAccountability.org said the report should serve as a wake-up call to Leo, who she noted had seemed to minimize the scandal\u2019s enormity in an interview stressing the need to protect priests\u2019 rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe global church has hundreds of millions of children under its care, and it is still failing to prioritize their safety,\u201d she said in a statement.<\/p>\n

The report included an audit of child protection policies and practices in more than a dozen countries, as well as two religious orders, a lay movement and the Vatican office responsible for the church in the developing world.<\/p>\n

It gave high marks to church leadership in Malta, South Korea and Slovakia, where most dioceses responded to the commission\u2019s questionnaire on prevention policies.<\/p>\n

But even in Italy \u2013 the Vatican\u2019s backyard \u2013 only 81 of 226 dioceses responded. In places like Mali, the challenges appear greater: the bishops conference website \u201cdoes not seem to be functioning and accessible.\u201d<\/p>\n

The report revealed that the Dicastery for Evangelization\u2019s missionary office, responsible for 1,124 dioceses in Asia, Africa, Oceania and parts of Latin America \u2013 or a third of the church\u2019s dioceses \u2013 had received only a \u201csmall number of cases,\u201d and just two reports of bishops who covered up abuse.<\/p>\n

That is a staggeringly low number given the size of the territory. It suggests the Vatican still has a long way to go in regions where abuse \u2013 especially same-sex abuse \u2013 remains taboo and where the church faces broader issues of war, conflict and poverty.<\/p>\n

Commission member Benyam Dawit Mezmur, an Ethiopian jurist, said he cringes when the church claims there are no abuse cases in Africa, when the truth is they are not being reported. A lack of resources and societal and cultural barriers are mostly to blame.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know for a fact that there are cases,\u201d he said. \u201cBut we need to look deeper and see why are they not being reported. Are the structures in place? Are there issues about reprisals? Are there issues that we need to address about power relations?\u201d<\/p>\n

He said encouraging a culture of reporting requires empowering minors and their families to report abuse and educating them about child protection and prevention.<\/p>\n

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP\u2019s collaboration with The Conversation U.S., with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

protection board also backs tougher sanctions for abusers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16078,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16077"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16077\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20003,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16077\/revisions\/20003"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16078"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16077"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}