Shedding Light is the title of the report chosen by the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) to document cases of paedophilia and sexual abuse within the Spanish Church. In this document, presented last December, a total of 806 cases registered by this governing body of the Spanish clergy nationwide. However, as reported by El País yesterday, the church breaks down only 205 cases as proven in that same study.
This figure also greatly differs from the report by the Victims Care Unit (UAV) of the Office of the Ombudsman led by Ángel Gabilondo, towards the end of last year, which counted a total of 1,281 cases nationwide. However, following the publication of their work, the UAV has added nearly a hundred more cases. The contradicting data published in both reports – that of the Ombudsman and the CEE – is evident and rather than shedding light on this terrible scourge that tarnishes members of the clergy in Spain, it darkens a reality that for a long time was shrouded in silence.
And the Canary Islands are no different in terms of the data compared in both national reports. In fact, the report presented by the Ombudsman indicates that the Church only registers 9 out of the 22 cases of sexual abuse or paedophilia gathered in both the interviews conducted by the Ombudsman’s office, those accounted for by the two dioceses of the Canary Islands Archipelago, as well as the data collected in the database published by the newspaper El País since 2018.
In this latest CEE report, there is another almost unbelievable twist, as it separates the complaints it deems “credible” from those it notes as “not credible”. In fact, there are cases that have gone through civil judicial bodies (not canonical) with firm sentences and convictions that the Spanish Church in this report does not validate, indicating that they are cases that are either not counted, continuing with canonical investigation, or are still pending resolution by the corresponding ecclesiastical bodies of the investigations mandated to be initiated by Pope Francis.
In the case of the Nivariense Diocese, as noted by Domingo Navarro Mederos, who is responsible for the Office for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Persons (established in 2020), “we have received knowledge of five complaints of sexual abuse, three of them occurred a long time ago, before the creation of this office and all were resolved through the canonical process,” Navarro points out, adding that “there is another case that came to light after 2020 and was also resolved through the canonical process.” The head of this office declined to provide further information on this last case, highlighting that “it was resolved within the canonical domain, not within the civil jurisdiction.”
Allegations in the Canary Islands
Below are the known cases of allegations and which ones have been registered by the church: La Salle San Ildefonso School in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, La Salle Antúnez School in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria; Salesian School in Teror, Gran Canaria; Salesian San Isidro School in La Orotava; Scout Group Aguere 70 of Nava La Salle School in La Laguna; San Bartolomé Apóstol Parish in Tejina; Major Seminary in La Laguna. Additionally, there are two more cases where the location is not identified, only the localities: one in Santa Cruz de La Palma and another in the capital of Tenerife.
To these cases, we must add the following known locations: Parochial House in La Gomera, Opus Dei Centre in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Opus Dei Senior Residence Centre in Santa Cruz de Tenerife; Cristo School in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria; San Juan de Dios Boarding School in Las Palmas; La Salle School in Arucas; Salesian School in Santa Cruz de Tenerife; San Antonio María Claret School in Las Palmas; Pureza de María Congregation; Casa Aguilar Parish in Santa María de Guía; Brothers of the White Cross Residence in Puerto de la Cruz and lastly, a private residence in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.
The secrecy with which the Spanish church handles these cases, of which the total number of victims who suffered abuses is not even known in each of them, does not even address two of the main demands of victims of sexual abuse: that the truth be revealed and that there is effective reparation for the victims.
Ciro Molina: “We aim to file a joint lawsuit at the Vatican”
“At least we have felt heard”. This is how Ciro Molina summarises the meeting he had with other victims of sexual abuse, who are part of the National Association Stolen Childhood (ANIR), with Luis Argüello and José Cobo, president and vice-president of the Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) on the 25th of March to promote a working group for the reparation of the victims.
Molina is the only victim of sexual abuse within the Church in Tenerife who has come forward and publicly demanded the dismissal of the current bishop of the Nivariense Diocese, Bernardo Álvarez, who was Vicar General when his family reported the abuses he suffered at the hands of a parish priest in Tejina (La Laguna) between 1997 and 2004. In this case, there are two more victims of this same priest.
Yesterday, Molina stated that the association to which he belongs will “file a joint lawsuit, with as many cases of victims as possible, at the Vatican, regardless of the investigations that may be carried out in Spain,” he announced.
Regarding the meeting between the association’s representatives and the president of the CEE, Molina told this newspaper that they asked the CEE to “recognise the Victims’ Statute, because there are many people who were victims and have passed away without receiving effective justice; we demand a real support system for victims as well as assistance for victims’ therapies and financial compensation”.
Molina expressly requested that “the Church does not equate cases of sexual abuse committed in other areas with those that have occurred within the Church, and this is not to diminish the significance of the other cases,” he stated. Likewise, the association requested that victims be taken into account, complaints be addressed, aggressors identified and called out to apologise to the victims, Molina affirmed, as in his specific case, the priest who abused him “continued to serve for 10 more years after the complaint was filed and is now retired, living on a pension in a house in Tacoronte.”
