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Peter Beer (archive photo): »This church cannot enlighten itself«
Photo: Tobias Hase / picture alliance / dpa
The former Vicar General of Munich and Freising, Peter Beer, accuses the Archdiocese of being unwilling to provide information in cases of abuse: “This church cannot enlighten itself.
That's my bitter experience," he told Die Zeit.
This is one of the reasons why he resigned from his position two years ago.
"The resistance was too great, even for a vicar general."
From 2010 to 2020, Beer was the second most powerful man in the diocese after Cardinal Marx.
The experts from the law firm Westpfahl Spilker Wastl (WSW) certified that the cleric wanted to clarify consistently during his term of office, against bitter internal resistance.
Now Beer said he had already seen in 2010: "We have no isolated cases of abuse, but a system." The institution had acted "disgracefully" - and then, as now, resist efforts to clarify.
“A cardinal told me I was a bad priest.
Someone from the cathedral chapter called me a traitor,” says Beer.
»Everything tried against the offender protectors«
"If you attack hierarchies, if you want to make ruling knowledge transparent, you will be blocked and shot back," said Beer.
He had "tried everything against the offender protectors," said Beer about the blockers.
»But in the end I could hardly change the apparatus.«
The former vicar general admitted that during his tenure he made mistakes in investigating abuse, which the Westpfahl Spilker Wastl law firm listed.
He said he didn't want to look for "excuses" for his mistakes.
"They happened, I'm responsible for that, just as I, as vicar general, had ultimate responsibility for the entire organization of the archdiocese."
Beer demanded: »The church must no longer be a sanctuary for clerics who are afraid of life, afraid of sexuality, afraid of closeness, afraid of responsibility.
We have to understand: Criticism is not to our detriment, but a condition for a new beginning.«
The WSW report, commissioned by the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising itself, comes to the conclusion that cases of sexual abuse in the diocese have not been dealt with appropriately for decades.
It accuses the cardinals and former archbishops Friedrich Wetter and Joseph Ratzinger as well as the current one, Reinhard Marx, of misconduct.
The experts speak of at least 497 victims and 235 suspected perpetrators, but assume a significantly larger number of unreported cases.
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