Calling Protesters in Chile ‘Dumb,’ Pope Francis Sets Off Uproar, by Pascale Bonnefoy, New York Times (October 7, 2015)

SANTIAGO, Chile — Many watched in disbelief: There he was, Pope Francis, calling people in Osorno, a city in southern Chile, “dumb” for protesting against a bishop accused of being complicit in clerical sexual abuse.

“The Osorno community is suffering because it’s dumb,” Pope Francis told a group of tourists on St. Peter’s Square, because it “has let its head be filled with what politicians say, judging a bishop without any proof.”

“Don’t be led by the nose by the leftists who orchestrated all of this,” the pope said.

The video, filmed by an Argentine tourist in May, was obtained by a Chilean television station and broadcast Friday, quickly instilling doubts here about the pope’s commitment to protecting victims of sexual abuse.

Under a heavy rain, demonstrators with black balloons chanted again outside the San Mateo Cathedral in Osorno on Sunday as the bishop at the center of the controversy, Juan Barros, said mass.

Bishop Barros was appointed by the pope to head the Diocese of Osorno this year, despite reports that he had covered up sexual abuses committed by the Rev. Fernando Karadima, a prominent priest in Santiago, the capital.Bishop Barros spent over 30 years alongside Father Karadima, who was found guilty of sexual abuses by the Vatican in 2011 and ordered to a life of seclusion, prayer and penitence. According to some of Father Karadima’s victims, Bishop Barros was witness to and complicit in the abuses.

Hundreds of demonstrators interrupted Bishop Barros’s installation ceremony in March, blocking his passage and shouting, “Barros, get out of the city!” The protests have not stopped since, but this time the anger has turned to the pope.

“The pope’s comments aggravated our discontent,” said Juan Carlos Claret, a spokesman for Osorno’s Lay Organization, which has been holding protests and candlelight vigils against Bishop Barros for months.

“It is the Church of Osorno that is demonstrating; we are not taking orders from political parties,” Mr. Claret said. “We are now seeing the real face of Pope Francis, and we demand an explanation.”

In the video, Pope Francis asserted that the accusations against Bishop Barros were unfounded and that a Chilean court had dismissed such claims. However, a judicial investigation into the presumed negligence and cover-up of church officials regarding Father Karadima’s abuses is still in progress.

Three of Father Karadima’s victims filed a lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Church in 2012, demanding nearly $660,000 in compensation after a criminal investigation into abuses committed from 1980 to 1995 was dismissed in 2011 because the statute of limitations had expired.One of the victims, Juan Carlos Cruz, contends that Bishop Barros was frequently present in Father Karadima’s bedroom when he and others were abused; threatened seminarians who dared denounce them; and destroyed letters reporting the abuses to the archbishop of Santiago at the time, Juan Francisco Fresno, when Bishop Barros was the archbishop’s personal secretary in the 1980s.

Bishop Barros is one of two dozen witnesses who the plaintiffs have requested be interrogated as part of the lawsuit.

“The pope’s statements are not surprising, but it is sad,” Mr. Cruz said. “The vision of a pope closer to abuse victims has been unmasked.”

On Wednesday, lawyers for Father Karadima’s victims asked the judge in the case, Juan Manuel Muñoz, to order the pope “to hand over any information he may possess” related to the court case that he said had been dismissed against Bishop Barros.

Vatican officials declined to comment.

Pope Francis’ remarks came on the heels of another revelation related to the Karadima case. Last month, leaked emails between the archbishop-emeritus of Santiago, Cardinal Francisco Javier Errázuriz, and the archbishop, Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, revealed that they had blocked Mr. Cruz from being appointed to the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, created by Pope Francis in March 2014.

“I hope that doesn’t happen,” Cardinal Ezzati wrote in June 2014, referring to Mr. Cruz’s appointment. “That would be very serious for the Chilean church. It would mean, among other things, giving credit to and endorsing what Mr. Cruz has astutely construed.”

“I hope you can shed light to those in charge of this appointment,” the cardinal continued, according to the emails, which were obtained by the news site El Mostrador.

Cardinal Errázuriz responded later that evening: “Tomorrow Monday, first thing in the morning, I will be at the office of the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to impede the evil you write about. If he doesn’t accept it, I will speak with the Holy Father.”

In an email a year earlier, in April 2013, Cardinal Ezzati wrote Cardinal Errázuriz seeking advice on how to “intervene in Rome” to impede Mr. Cruz from attending an international conference to deliver his testimony.

The next day, Cardinal Errázuriz provided several solutions, and ended his email with, “The Serpent will not prevail!”

In 2013, the pope appointed Cardinal Errázuriz to a nine-member advisory Council of Cardinals on the governance of the church.

Last week, Judge Muñoz interrogated Cardinal Errázuriz for five hours in the presence of two of Father Karadima’s victims, Juan Hamilton and José Murillo. The cardinal admitted to blocking Mr. Cruz from the papal commission and said that he had not believed the victim’s accusations because Father Karadima had the reputation of a saint, according to a court statement.