DENVER (CO)
Crux
June 4, 2018
By Inés San Martín
Rome – It’s a universally acknowledged reality of the sea that it’s never the tip of the iceberg that sinks a ship, but what lies under the water unseen. Yet, to the trained eye, the visible white mass usually is enough to warn of the dangers ahead and to change course.
In the case of Chile’s clerical sexual abuse scandals, Pope Francis first brushed against the tip of the iceberg in 2015, when he decided to transfer a Chilean bishop named Juan Barros, accused of having covered up abuse, to a southern diocese.
Yet Francis repeatedly ignored the alarms that came loud and clear. Victims of the pedophile priest Fernando Karadima, for whom Barros allegedly covered up, spoke with anyone who would listen, including members of the pope’s own Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors. The media, both in Chile and in Rome, kept the case in the spotlight. Chilean politicians sent a letter to the pope asking him to change course, and even some bishops spoke up against the nomination.
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