The Spanish Episcopal Conference (CEE) will present its Instruction on the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable people today, Thursday, after the report was published on May 9, and with which the bishops seek to “strengthen the institutional and regulatory commitment of the Catholic Church in Spain to prevent and deal with abuses against minors”, as well as “guaranteeing a unitary way of proceeding throughout the territory of the CEE”.
The presentation of the document will take place on Thursday at 4:30 p.m. in the Sedes Sapientiae Building, of the CEE, and next to it the report ‘To give light’ will also be released. The act will begin with the intervention of the Secretary General and spokesperson of the CEE, Francisco César García Magán.
Subsequently, the coordinator of the Coordination and Advice Service of the child protection offices, Jesús Rodríguez Torrente, will present the framework protocol for prevention and action in case of abuse; and, next, he will present the instruction on abuses, together with Carlos López and Carlos Morán. To conclude the act, the general secretary of the bishops, together with the director of the information office, José Gabriel Vera, will present the report ‘To give light’, on the same subject.
In the instruction on sexual abuse of minors that they will present, the prelates reaffirm “the principle of collaboration with secular justice” and promise to “encourage” victims to report to state authorities, “without excluding the possibility of that the diocese itself or the institute may, where appropriate, appear in the corresponding criminal proceedings”.
Likewise, among other norms, the bishops indicate that the transfer of a priest accused of sexual abuse of minors “is not in principle a sufficient precautionary measure” and advises taking into account “circumstances” such as “whether or not the accused performs a pastoral activity that involves contact with minors, if it is a complaint about recent or distant events in time or if the facts have been admitted by the defendant themself”.
The text was approved at the last plenary assembly of the CEE and it is a general decree that has already been approved by the bishops and that has been sent to the Holy See, and to which they have now given the green light “in the form of an instruction”.
In addition, by approving it as an instruction for the Church in Spain, the bishops have added the new provisions established by the definitive text of ‘Vos estis Lux mundi’, which was approved by Pope Francis.
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