EL PAÍS launched an investigation into pedophilia in the Spanish Church in 2018 and did a database updated with all known cases. If you know of any cases that have not seen the light of day, you can write to us at: Abusos@elpais.es. If it is Latin America, the address is: abusesamerica@elpais.es.
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On Saturday, after 11 days of controversy, the Vatican finally dismissed the bishop of Cadiz and Ceuta, Rafael Zornoza, as the Holy See Press Office briefly announced in its daily midday bulletin. The formula adopted to give him a way out and try to stop the scandal was to accept his resignation, already presented automatically last year when he turned 75, as all bishops do when they reach that age. At the same time, the Spanish Episcopal Conference (EEC) announced the appointment of Ramón Darío Valdivia Giménez, until now auxiliary bishop of Seville, as apostolic administrator of the diocese.
The news comes after EL PAÍS revealed on November 10 that the Vatican opened a canonical investigation four months ago against Zornoza for an accusation of child abuse in the 1990s – therefore already prescribed by the courts – when he was a priest in Getafe, province of Madrid, and directed the major seminary of the diocese. It is the first time that in Spain we know of the case of a bishop canonically investigated for an alleged case of pedophilia, and it is the first time that we know that the Vatican has removed one for this reason.
The bishop of Cadiz assured, after the news was published, that the accusations were false and announced that he was suspending his agenda “to clarify the facts”. He also said he was doing it to treat cancer, an unknown detail he revealed for the first time. The trial against him is being conducted in Madrid by the Tribunal de la Rota of the nunciature, the Vatican embassy.
Faced with doubts about having retained his position, Leo XIV himself explained to questions from the press on Tuesday that “the investigation must be able to continue”. Once concluded, he added, “the consequences will come.” And after four days they arrived. Faced with the Pope’s decision, the Rota tribunal must have found sufficient evidence to justify its withdrawal, after having collected the statements of the people involved.
This delay in Zornoza’s removal contrasts with one of the main recommendations of the Pontifical Commission for Minors of the Holy See in its latest report, presented last month: to speed up the dismissal of priests involved in cases of abuse. The entity highlighted “the importance of a simplified protocol for the resignation or dismissal of Church leaders or staff in cases of abuse or neglect.”
The Vatican has finally taken the step after days of confusion and ambiguity, faced with an unprecedented scandal in the Spanish Church that has put both the EEC and the Pope to the test. With this case Leo XIV had to face for the first time, since he was elected six months ago, a complaint of pedophilia against a high ecclesiastical office. The challenge for him was to define his position regarding this plague and how he will act from now on. In reality it was the clumsy handling of the complaint, both in the Vatican and in the Spanish Church, that left him with the hot potato, and at the moment of truth it was not decisive. In the midst of the internal wars within the Church that worry him so much, he preferred to find a balance and refer to established procedures.
Furthermore, the case of the bishop of Cadiz has posed to the Pope the question of how the Spanish Church has behaved in the face of the scandal of clerical pedophilia and whether it should now do something about it. The truth is that the EEC has lived protected by years of inertia on the part of Francis, who had entrusted the previous president of the bishops, the cardinal and archbishop of Barcelona, Juan José Omella, with the task of taking care of it, with few results and much criticism from the victims. It remains to be seen in the coming months whether the crisis generated by the Zornoza case will have greater consequences, as the Pope said, at a deeper level in the Spanish Church.
In a few days it has been demonstrated that this crisis has produced a surprising short circuit between the leadership of the Spanish bishops and the Holy See. To deal with the impact of the news, the Spanish Church leaked to numerous media outlets last week that Zornoza would be removed shortly. It was even hypothesized and published that the Vatican had already announced the resignation in last Saturday’s bulletin. But nothing happened that day.
Then, this Monday, the executive commission of the Episcopal Conference (EEC) had its first meeting with the Pope in Rome, in which he participated with great enthusiasm. On leaving, the president of the EEC, Luis Argüello, limited himself to saying that the termination “could happen soon” and defended the presumption of innocence of the accused. Starting Tuesday, the bishops held their plenary assembly all week, which Zornoza did not attend, and avoided the issue.
In reality, the bishop’s resignation had already been on the table for more than a year, when the bishop turned 75. But it is normal for the Pontiff to leave them in office for a few more years, unless they have health problems or want to send a subtle signal of disapproval for some issue, which many times does not even transcend. Considering the complaint against Zornoza and the scandal that occurred when it came to light, the quickest way to stop it was to execute the resignation already submitted.
The truth is that it could have happened as soon as the complaint became known this summer, to give it an immediate and discreet solution, one of the management failures of this case. Another option was to immediately apply precautionary measures, but neither the Vatican nor the archbishopric of Seville, to which the case was entrusted by Rome, did so, even if it was then delegated to the Tribunal de la Rota.
The Holy See became aware of the case this summer, after a victim sent a complaint via email to the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. All this time, the Holy See and the Spanish Church kept Zornoza in office, and he continued to be in contact with minors.
The canonists consulted by this newspaper say that, given the seriousness of the case and since it concerns a bishop, precautionary measures could have been taken, such as removing him from office, already by the Vatican, when the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith received the complaint. They may also have been requested by the Dicastery of Bishops, which is automatically informed of a case involving the head of a diocese. Subsequently, the request for precautionary measures may have arrived in Spain, when the investigation landed in the archbishopric of Seville.
“The paralysis controlled me”
The abuse that the victim describes in her complaint, to which this newspaper had access, began in 1994, when she was 14, and continued until she was 21. “I write this letter only with the intention of preventing what happened to me from continuing to happen to another child”, were the first lines of the letter sent to the Vatican. Zornoza was 45 years old at the time and was rector of the major seminary of the diocese of Getafe, a bishopric created three years earlier.
“It was at night when he came to the room and suffered the abuse. He entered my bed, caressed me and kissed me. Even in the morning he woke me up in the same way. In those moments I never said anything to him, the paralysis controlled me,” the complainant states in the document. The alleged abuse – touching, caresses on the private parts and kisses on the mouth – would also have occurred in social gatherings and camps until the victim reached the age of majority.
When the complainant turned 18 he entered the seminary: “At the same time, I recognized my homosexuality. Rafa allowed me to enter the seminary and took me to conversion therapy for treatment my homosexuality.” At that time, the letter says, Zornoza went to bed “almost every night and every morning” to kiss him and touch his private parts. “On several occasions I complained to Rafa that what we were doing was not right. He always told me that it was an intimate friendship,” the victim writes.
The former seminarian explains that Zornoza “had a high ability to manipulate” him. “An example of the ability to manipulate and control me was the confessions,” he continues. In them the complainant underlines that he felt a great sense of guilt “and made me see that I was not capable of loving or understanding a friendship”. “After confessing my homosexual acts, I went to bed and a few minutes later he came into my bed and caressed me,” he says. According to the experts consulted, the possible misuse of the sacrament of confession could constitute another serious crime in the canonical process.
