They were minors, came from all regions and all social classes and suffered sexual violence, which is often already prescribed: In Portugal, an independent commission estimated the “minimum number” of victims of sexual violence within the Portuguese Catholic Church since 1950 at 4,815 people.
This six-member expert commission, which presented its final report in Lisbon on Monday 13 February, has heard more than 500 testimonies during its work of about a year, which has “allowed it to reach a much larger network of victims”, according to the coordinator of this expert commission , child psychiatrist Pedro Strecht.
The latter, commissioned by the Portuguese Church in late 2021 to set up a team to measure the level of pedocrime within it, indicated that the vast majority of the crimes denounced were already prescribed. “It is difficult now that everything stays the same in relation to sexual violence against minors in Portugal and the awareness of its traumatic effects,” he told the press and several church leaders.
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A “scourge of the life of the Church”
The reaction of the President of the Portuguese Bishops’ Conference, Bishop of Leiria-Fatima, José Ornelas, is expected at the end of the day on Monday 13 February. In addition, the Portuguese bishops plan to meet in early March to draw the independent report’s conclusions and “eradicate as much as possible this scourge from the life of the Church,” the bishops’ conference secretary said in January. , Father Manuel Barbosa. In April 2022, Cardinal Patriarch of Lisbon and supreme prelate of the Portuguese Church, Manuel Clemente, declared that he was ready to “acknowledge the mistakes of the past” and “ask forgiveness” from the victims.
With thousands of cases of sexual violence committed by priests coming to light worldwide, and allegations of a cover-up by members of the clergy, Pope Francis pledged in 2019 to wage an “all-out fight” against pedophilia within the communion’s church . The World Youth Days, which take place at the beginning of August, are also expected in the Portuguese capital.
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Initiatives have attempted to measure this phenomenon in several countries, including Ireland, Germany, Australia and the Netherlands. In France, the Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church, in a report published in October 2021, estimated the number of adults who suffered sexual violence as minors at the hands of a priest, deacon or religious at 216,000. That number rises to 330 000 if we include the victims of lay people associated with the Catholic Church (e.g. school wardens).