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.
───────────
The bishops and senior officials of the Spanish orders responded with evasive statements when, seven years ago, EL PAÍS launched the investigation into pedophilia in the Catholic Church. Even with silence: 50 of the 70 dioceses did not even respond to the first questionnaire on the number of cases of which they were aware or had been instructed in their ecclesiastical courts. The majority of those who responded either avoided providing information or stressed that they had no evidence of complaints (it was later learned that some of those bishoprics had lied). The first article of this newspaper counts 34 convictions since the 1980s and that for decades the Catholic Church has silenced cases of pedophilia within it. The tip of an iceberg that will gradually get bigger.
What happened next was partly due to the email address (aiutos@elpais.es) opened by EL PAÍS and to which several thousand people have since written to tell their story. These testimonies allowed journalistic work to continue, for their stories to be investigated (the vast majority barred before criminal justice) and for the Spanish Church and the Congress of Deputies to accept the problem and the worrying figures. Seven years later, this newspaper counts 2,958 victims and 1,570 defendants in the only available database. It was also revealed that, for the first time in history, the Vatican is investigating a Spanish bishop, Cadiz prelate Rafael Zornoza, for child abuse in the 1990s, whom the Pope finally removed from office this Saturday.
The accusations against Zornoza were known 12 days ago, but the first ones reached this newspaper at the beginning of 2019. Since then, as happens in many cases, it has been investigated, interviewing people who may have known what happened, possible victims, members of the clergy… At the time this newspaper had already published several cases demonstrating not only abuse by the clergy, but also cover-ups of bishops and transfers of pedophiles to new destinations, some in Latin America, to cover up the scandal. But the Church’s response was the same: denial. “Not all victims who appear in EL PAÍS tell the truth,” an EEC spokesperson told this newspaper.
Only because of the title and pressure from Pope Francis have they forced the Spanish Church to open offices to care for victims of abuse. Some dioceses and religious congregations continue to not adequately respect this guideline (they do not respond to messages from those affected, do not investigate their cases or repair them). The Pope organized a summit in Rome in February 2019 to address the problem and reformed canon law so that a canonical investigation would be opened for any reports of possible abuse. First, a formal notice was necessary. In some countries where the Catholic Church is present (Ireland, Belgium, Holland, USA, Australia…) general investigations into the past had already begun, where thousands of cases had emerged and the ecclesiastical hierarchy had already begun to pay compensation. The EEC, however, insisted that Spain represents an exception and that there are fewer cases than in other states, although it admitted it did not know the number.
EL PAÍS’ investigation continued: it published cases, updated the accounting of its database (more than 300 victims and 800 defendants in April 2021), witnessed dozens of e-mail which arrived in the mailbox and continued to investigate cases, including that of Msgr. Zornoza. Although some orders, such as the Jesuits or the Legionaries of Christ, have published reports with data and on their internal management, the Spanish Church in general has remained stuck in denial. Nor did he react when this newspaper began publishing reports that suddenly revealed dozens of cases in schools that exposed the cover-up and pointed to great figures: such as Cesario Gabarain, the star priest who composed the most famous mass chants (Together like brothers, Fisher of men, Death is not the end…).
At the end of 2021, EL PAÍS included in a report 251 cases that it handed over to Francis during a papal flight. Another copy was donated to the then president of the EEC, Cardinal Juan José Omella. The Church was forced to open an unprecedented investigation. The issue jumped to the political agenda and in early 2022 the Congress of Deputies approved by a majority that the Ombudsman launch a study to determine the scope of the problem. The Spanish bishops attacked the government and called the initiative “a Sadducean trap”. Only a month later they rectified and, after years of refusing to investigate their past, announced the commission of an audit by the law firm Cremades & Calvo-Sotelo.
This newspaper’s database did not stop growing, it delivered four more reports to the Vatican (more than 800 testimonies in a total of more than 1,600 pages) and published reports that revealed how up to 61 bishops covered up, silenced or covered up these crimes. As the numbers increased, the sector of the Church that wanted to lift the rug gained weight and began to partially publish the cases of which it was aware, such as the archdiocese of Madrid or Bilbao.
In October 2023, the Guarantor published the results of its report, which contained a large investigation according to which 1.13% of adult Spaniards had been victims of ecclesial pedophilia (approximately 440,000 people). Omella attacked the press for using those figures and accused the media of having “the intention to deceive”. A few months later, Cremades delivered his report that counted more cases than this newspaper recorded and highlighted the bishops’ mishandling of the problem for decades.
After a year of resistance, the Church began to compensate victims through its own plan that dozens of those affected criticized as partial and “sloppy.” They also recanted and agreed to negotiate with the government a plan to compensate people who refuse to undergo their internal trials. A news they announced this week, in the midst of the Zornoza scandal, the first time that one of them, belonging to the ecclesiastical hierarchy who voted and had a say in decisions (such as those concerning the management of pedophilia), was accused of having abused a minor when he was a priest in Getafe. Another case among those investigated in the last seven years by EL PAÍS.
