The pontiff emeritus Benedict XVI was severely implicated in an independent report presented this Thursday, January 20 in Germany on the sexual abuse of minors in the archdiocese of Munich, which he led around the 1980s.
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Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, before he became pope, failed to act to prevent abuse by clerics in four cases, authors of church-mandated report claim at press conference .
In a statement sent to lawyers, the pope emeritus "
strictly
" rejects any responsibility, a position that the authors of the report do not consider "
credible
", said lawyer Martin Pusch.
Several assaults attested
In two cases, they were members of the clergy who had committed several attacks attested, including by courts, he underlines. The two priests remained within the Church and nothing was done, he accused. Experts said they were convinced that Mrg Ratzinger was thus aware of the pedophile past of priest Peter Hullermann, who arrived in 1980 from North Rhine-Westphalia in Bavaria, where he continued abuse for decades without being worried.
In 1986, a court sentenced him to a suspended prison sentence.
But he was then transferred to another Bavarian city, where he would have reoffended.
It will be necessary to wait until 2010 before this priest is forced into retirement.
Joseph Ratzinger denied knowing the past of this priest, whose case made headlines in 2010, at the time of the pontificate of Benedict XVI.
The report's authors also singled out Cardinal Reinhard Marx, current archbishop of Munich and Freising, for being negligent in two cases of priests suspected of child molestation.
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Overall, the report denounces systematic cover-ups of cases of violence against minors between 1945 and 2019 aimed, according to them, "
to protect the institution of the Church
".
“
The consideration
” of the victims “
remains insufficient from many points of view, also after 2010
”, when the first pedophilia scandals in the German church were revealed, he judges.
