In Australia, 7% of Catholic priests participated in the seduction of children, the investigation showed

In Australia, about 7% of the priests of the Catholic Church were involved in the cases of corruption of children. Such data was voiced on Monday by the royal commission to investigate sexual abuse of children, CNN reports.

The investigation has been conducted since 2013. During this time, the commission held 50 hearings. It turned out that from January 1980 to February 2015, 4444 children became victims of sexual violence by priests. The average age of victims was 10.5 years for girls and 11.6 years for boys.

Persons of 1880 suspects managed to establish. Of these, 32% were monks, 5% were nuns, 30% - priests and 29% - laity who worked in the church.

The head of the Council of Truth, Justice and Healing of the Church, Francis Sullivan, called the data voiced by the commission "shocking." “These numbers are tragic and unforgivable,” he said.

In turn, the senior adviser to the Royal Commission, Gail Feress, noted that cases of violence against children in the church were often hidden. The investigations were not conducted, and the priests noticed in abuses were simply transferred to other communities, where no one knew anything about their crimes. Any documentation confirming the unsightly actions of the clergy was not preserved or deliberately destroyed.

Cases of pedophilia by priests are one of the main problems for the Roman Catholic Church. The first loud scandals broke out in the early 2000s. The process was indicative, held in September 2001 in France. There, the court sentenced Bishop Bayo to three years in prison. His fault was that he did not inform the police about cases of sexual harassment in relation to children from one of the priests in his diocese.

Numerous cases of sexual violence against children committed by Catholic priests led to the initiation of hundreds of criminal cases in various countries. So, in Australia, from 1993 to 2010, 100 Catholic priests were convicted for depraved actions against young people. In January 2008, Belgium Brussels court sentenced to five years the prison of Abbot Robbert Borreman, finding him guilty of committing pedophilia acts regarding his young godson. For several years, Borreman for several years forced an 11-year-old boy to join him in homosexual sexual intercourse.

One of the high -profile scandals erupted in 2009 in Ireland. Then about 100 clergymen were charged with pedophilia, many of whom pleaded guilty.

All this caused a loud international scandal and sharp criticism of the media to the Vatican. In July 2014, the Pope Francis said that he has reliable information that allows us to say that about 2% of the Catholic priests are pedophiles. “Among these 2% of pedophiles are priests, bishops, cardinals. But there are much more ministers of the church who know about it, but are silent,” the pontiff admitted then.