The move comes days after Pope Francis met with bishops to discuss the crisis.
Thirty-four Chilean bishops have resigned together over the Catholic child sex abuse scandals.
The unprecedented move — which saw the entire Chilean church leadership offer to step down — came shortly after a meeting with Pope Francis over the scale of sexual abuse and its cover-up in Chile. It is to date the most significant formal acceptance of responsibility for abuse by members of the church hierarchy anywhere in the world.
While child sex abuse scandals have dogged the Catholic Church worldwide, the scandal in Chile centers on the figure of Rev. Fernando Karadima. In 2011, a Vatican investigation found Karadima guilty of a series of child sexual abuse that took place throughout the 1970s and ’80s. (The case was never prosecuted under criminal law, and Karadima, now 87, lives in a nursing home in Chile.) A number of critics have accused Karadima’s protégé, Bishop Juan Barros, of being complicit in the abuse by covering for Karadima and allowing his behavior to go unpunished.
The mass resignation appears to be an acknowledgment that the Chilean church — which has consistently defended Barros and maintained his innocence — is accepting responsibility for wrongdoing.
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