In Madrid, Leo XIV met privately with victims of abuse within the Church: “It is a plague,” he admitted in a meeting with the bishops

On Saturday, however, already on the flight to Madrid and before landing in Barajas, the pontiff confirmed that he would meet with a group of them.

“I am going to receive some victims, unfortunately, it is impossible to receive everyone those who ask for it,” said Leo XIV.

The meeting took place this Monday afternoon, before Leo XIV attended the Almudena Cathedral to pray to the Virgin.

The Pope was with victims of Repair projectan initiative of the archdiocese of Madrid, a decision that caused discomfort among other organizations of people who were attacked in ecclesiastical settings.

Many of them demand that the government of Pedro Sánchez, a law so that crimes of pedophilia do not prescribe

At noon, meeting with the bishops Spaniards in the Episcopal Conference, the pontiff did not avoid talking about abuses within the Church.

He defined as a painful moment the one experienced by “those who have been hurt precisely by those who were supposed to care for them, even by members of the clergy.”

“Ante this plague -said Leo XIV-, the ecclesial community is called to respond with listening, truth, justice, reparation and an increasingly determined commitment to prevention and a culture of care.”

“Every wounded person must be able to find sincere listening, welcome, protection and real paths to healing,” Leo XIV asked the bishops.

In his welcome speech to the pope, King Felipe VI referred for the first time to the “pain caused by cases of abuse, which are not and cannot be representative of the immense ecclesial community,” the king said Saturday at the Royal Palace.

Was the Crown’s first allusion to abuses but the monarch’s words generated displeasure among the victims, who felt minimized the trauma they had to live through.

“Your clarity and firmness, which I also want to recognize, are essential in the healing process and repair of the damage inflicted,” Philip VI told Leo XIV.

In front of the Madrid Apostolic Nunciature, where the Pope has slept since arriving in Spain, several victims’ organizations They scheduled demonstrations.

“On his trip to Spain he has to meet with the victims to find out what their bishops and their religious orders are doing to the victims in their name,” had requested Miguel Hurtado, the first complainant of abuses he suffered at the Montserrat Abbey, a religious site that appears on the papal agenda in Catalonia.

“Either he doesn’t care at all about the victims or he is not receiving adequate information,” Hurtado complained before learning that Leo XIV will finally meet in Madrid with some people who suffered abuse within the Church.

Two months ago, the government agreed with the Spanish Church to compensate victims of abuse by priests and religious.

According to the first official report on pedophilia within the Church that the Congress of Deputies entrusted to the Ombudsman, almost half a million Spaniards suffered abuse by priests, religious, consecrated lay people or people linked to the clergy and its institutions.

On Sunday, some people who suffered abuse by members of the clergy staged a drama at the door of the Nunciature a fictitious meeting with the pope.

“You have been highly praised for speaking very clearly and forcefully about international law, about the dignity of the human being, about the importance of respecting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Pope, you have to be consistent. One has to do and behave in accordance with what one preaches,” Miguel Hurtado said ironically in front of a photograph of Leo XIV.