The Bishop of Bilbao, Joseba Segura, has officiated this Friday afternoon in the Cathedral of Santiago an act of prayer for the victims of sexual abuse in the Diocese of Bilbao, in which he has indicated that forgiveness for these acts by the Church is "necessary, but not sufficient", and has encouraged to bring to light more cases of abuse that remain hidden.

During the event, the testimonies of the victims themselves were heard, who narrated their sufferings after being sexually abused within the Church.

In a Cathedral full of parishioners, Joseba Segura has acknowledged that there have been abusers in the Church. "We recognize that they are also part of our history, of what we have been, of what we have done. They do not define everything we have done, rather they reflect the opposite of what we have wanted to be and what we have wanted to do," he said.

In this sense, he lamented that "in the midst of the kindness of so many people, some have abused their position by performing acts of pure evil." "They have been ours and we recognize it," he insisted.

As he pointed out, this request for forgiveness is necessary because some victims have requested it, but today they do not close "any book". "We want the light to continue to be made and, thus, with the victims at the center of everything, having them as companions on the way, we will continue to learn more from them every day to be able to build our future on the truth," he added.

At this point, he has advanced that the work continues and they insist on "seeking the truth". As a first action to be developed, he stressed that the channels of communication remain open so that those who "for one reason or another, have not wanted to tell what happened until now", can do so with the certainty that they will be heard, that each case will be treated "with respect" and that the Diocese will listen "with the heart, not only with the ears" what the victims have suffered.

In addition, he recalled that the Diocese continues to communicate with the victims. "Those who have already spoken to us, we continue to listen to what you have to say to us and we continue to learn from what you can tell us. Those who have wanted to talk to me, I have discovered many things in direct conversations and now I am convinced that nothing can replace the experience of being able to meet them personally and listen to what they have to tell me," he said.

Therefore, he thanked those who "sometimes with perfectly understandable doubts" have taken the step of approaching and the Commission of abuses or himself, what they have lived, their "tragedy, anger and suffering". "I thank God for each and every one of these meetings so important for us, for our church, for all of us who want to continue learning," he added.

As a third step to take, he announced that the Diocese also wants to collaborate in a "pending task, which is no longer only" of the Church. "It is necessary to bring to light and to confront the abuses that remain hidden in various social settings, in families, in sports clubs or otherwise, the lucrative abuse that generates business, in child pornography or the numerous abuses that occur in the big business of human trafficking," he said. to assert that "there is much to do and that is certainly a task" of the Church, but it is the task "of many other people or groups." "It is the task, in short, of the whole society," he said.

PLAQUE IN MEMORY OF THE VICTIMS

During the act of prayer, a plaque was installed in the cloister of the cathedral in memory of all the victims of sexual abuse in the Church with the text "What you did to one of these little ones, you did to me". The other symbol placed was an olive tree, which will be planted in the Forest of Concorde, in the building of the Seminary of Derio.

The celebration of recognition and request for forgiveness has begun at six in the afternoon and the victims and the parishioners were invited to it. It has been wanted that the victims were the center of the celebration, so one of them, the priest Josu López Villalba, has co-celebrated the act with the bishop.

The music of the Amani Quartet and the cathedral organist, Gorka Iglesias, accompanied the liturgy. The director of the Commission, Carlos Olabarri, has read some of the testimonies of the story that the victims themselves have made to the team of volunteers who form the Commission, while several victims have placed some candles on the altar.

TESTIMONIES

"Disoriented, tormented, ignored, corrupted. I felt it was my fault that he had noticed me," Olabarri said, citing testimonies collected from a victim, to continue with another testimony: "I didn't tell anyone, I was totally scared. After that I needed psychological help. My life sank."

"I have never gone through so much humiliation and shame as with this fact, creating in me a guilt complex that I have dragged all my life," he quoted from another traumatic experience told by another victim.

Then a victim went up to the altar to relate "with pain and anger" what happened to them in the "infamous boarding school of the Holy House of Mercy to a group of poor innocent children, abuses committed by its director, the priest Canon José Luis Perdigo".

As he has said, although in this life he cannot see him "maybe I will see him in another eternity, in another heaven, to look at his face and ask for explanations." "I would ask him why so much evil, what need there was to harm us helpless and innocent children? If you knew you were a pedophile, why did you become a priest? Why do you tarnish the good name of the Catholic Church and its God, why do you break the lives of a generation of innocent children?"

He has also asserted that "children being abused is the cruelest and worst punishment that a child can inflict." "I cry inconsolably, I cry and cry until I empty my eye sockets, until I mitigate this great sorrow that grips me and overwhelms me for those abuses suffered in my childhood," he said, adding that "there are sins that cannot be forgiven or such serious and bitter offenses to forget those who had the duty to protect us and made us descend into hell with abuse, humiliation and rape."

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