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| Germany has been rocked by several clerical abuse scandals |
Germany's
Catholic Church has been hit by another case of clerical sexual abuse, with a
priest admitting to abusing three boys between the ages of 9 and 15 some 280
times since 2004.
A Catholic
priest admitted to a German court on Thursday that he sexually abused three
boys over several years, amounting to a total of 280 cases.
The priest,
identified as 46-year-old Andreas L. from the city of Salzgitter in Lower
Saxony, confessed to charges of sexually abusing the boys, who ranged from nine
to 15 years old. The abuse began in 2004, he said.
Instances
of abuse occurred at a parsonage, on ski vacations, at the parents' home, on a
trip to Disneyland in Paris and at a church shortly before Mass.
The priest
told the regional court in Braunschweig that while working as a chaplain in the
same city in 2004, he began a close relationship with a widowed woman. When he
was moved to Salzgitter, the woman's nine-year-old son often spent weekends
with the man, who would take him on short trips away. The abuse occurred on
several occasions, often three times per weekend.
The suspect
said it was not his intention to get close to the boy sexually, and that it
never occurred to him that he was harming them.
"I did
not have the impression that he didn't want it," he said.
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| Pope Benedict XVI expressed 'deep regret' at a meeting with sex abuse victims in Germany |
When the
mother began to suspect her son's interactions with the priest were
inappropriately close, she approached the diocese of Hildesheim, the priest's
employer, which forbid further contact with the boy.
Victims two
and three
The two
other boys named as victims by the priest were brothers, and the abuse began
under similar circumstances. When contact with them was also forbidden, the
priest approached his first victim, then 17, who in turn told his mother about
the abuse.
The mother
then went to the authorities, and the suspect was arrested last summer. The
court set the maximum sentence for the priest at six and a half years.
A long
series of sexual abuse scandals involving Catholic priests in Germany is
believed to have contributed to Germans leaving the Church in record numbers.
Some 180,000 Germans renounced their Catholicism in 2010, up 40 percent from
the previous year.
Pope
Benedict XVI met with victims of clerical sexual abuse during a visit to his
native Germany in September, expressing his deep regret. The German Catholic
Church faces some 600 claims for compensation because of abuse, and Berlin has
set up a fund of 100 million euros ($128 million) to pay for the victims'
therapy.
Author:
Andrew Bowen (Reuters, dpa)
Editor: Andreas Illmer
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"The angel's phone, at St John’s Cathedral, has just one button,"
the sculptor told journalists. "It directly dials God."
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