translated from Spanish: Piñera says there will be “truth and justice” for Church abuses after participating in Te Deum

President Sebastián Piñera said on Wednesday that there will be “truth and justice” for the cases and allegations of sexual abuse that have been committed within the Catholic Church.
“There have been too many allegations, there have been too many abuses and the only way to deal with this is with truth and justice, that’s what Chilean society wants and that’s what’s going to happen,” Piñera told the press after concluding the Ecumenical Te Deum held at Ca Santiago on the occasion of the Fiestas Patrias.
According to data from the Public Prosecutor’s Office, there are 166 open cases for abuses in the Chilean clergy, while the victims number 248, of which 131 were minors when they were subjected to the crimes.
Church-related persons who are investigated number more than 200, including 10 bishops, 152 priests, 9 deacons, 15 lay people, 8 people who are not available and 27 belonging to orders or congregations without being clerics.
Celestino Aós in charge
Te Deum was in charge of the Apostolic Administrator of Santiago, Archbishop Celestino Aós, who was appointed by Pope Francis on 23 March after the pontiff accepted the resignation of Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati, who is being investigated in Chile by alleged cover-up of sexual abuse cases.
In his homily, Aós made no direct reference to cases of abuse in the Church, although in a generic way he stated, “We have problems, limitations, and wounds, and sins.”
The preaching of Aós was an act of praise and generosity to God for the ethnic and cultural diversity of Chile, that of its native peoples and also that of immigrants.
In this regard, the religious thanked the “generosity of those who welcome and integrate people who arrive as immigrants from different countries”.
Aós also thanked for youth and children, for the defence of life, for marriage and for the contribution of women to society, among other things.
And the speaker of the House?
In political code, Piñera also regretted that some politicians, such as the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Ivan Flores, did not attend ecclesiastical activity.
“That in the month of the homeland, a month of unity, that some are absent is sad, regrettable, but our will was that they had all been,” the president said.
In his defence, Flores told El Mercurio that “it is no lack either administrative or protocol” not to go to the Te Deum because “the House is duly represented” in that act by his vice presidents, and that he decided to represent her by attending various acts in her region, Los Ríos.

Original source in Spanish