Probe Report Details Widespread Abuse Claims Inside Spanish Catholic Church

(MENAFN) An extensive investigation by a Spanish newspaper has reported thousands of allegations of child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in Spain, spanning multiple decades.

According to findings published after an eight-year data-gathering effort, more than 3,000 individuals have reportedly come forward claiming they were sexually abused as minors by members of the Church. When the investigation began in 2018, only a few dozen cases were publicly acknowledged, but the number has since grown significantly through a combination of survivor testimonies, court records, and institutional acknowledgments.

The earliest reported incidents are said to date back to the 1940s. The total number of individuals accused now stands at over 1,600, covering a small fraction of those who have served in clerical or lay positions in Spain over the past several decades.

The latest update to the investigation includes dozens of new testimonies involving both clergy and lay members, the vast majority of them men, along with a smaller number of cases reported from several Latin American countries.

The reporting outlet states that it has shared its findings with senior Church authorities, including national Church leadership, Vatican officials, and Spain’s human rights commissioner. However, it also notes that institutional responses have remained limited, with critics describing the Church’s handling of the issue as marked by a lack of transparency and denial, while responsibility has largely been shifted between different levels of Church authority.

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