Nearly 5,000 children were sexually abused by members of the Portuguese Catholic Church over the past 70 years, according to a report issued on Monday.
The report, which was compiled by a special commission tasked with investigating the church, reveals the victims were boys between the ages of 10 and 14. It also indicates that most of the offenders were priests.
Church officials had previously claimed that only a handful of cases had occurred, the Associated Press reported.
"We want to pay a sincere tribute to those who were abuse victims during their childhood and dared to give a voice to silence," child psychiatrist Pedro Strecht, who headed the commission, said while presenting the report, according to CNN. "They are much more than a statistic."
A rep for the Catholic Church says officials are prepared to "take appropriate measures."
While the statute of limitations has expired on most of the alleged cases, the AP says 512 alleged victims have already come forward with their stories and 25 allegations were passed to prosecutors. The report estimates the true number of victims as being 4,815 at an "absolute minimum."
According to the report, 96.9% of the perpetrators are male, 77% of cases involve "the Priest," and the perpetrator was already known to the victim in 46.7% of cases.
"Many of the abusers mentioned are still practicing in the Church," the report noted.
The most common place where abuse took place was seminaries (23%), followed by "church not otherwise specified" (18.8%), confessionals (14.3%), parish houses (12.9%), and religious schools (6.9%), according to the report.
The age of the abuser, types of abuse and locations where it took place are related factors, the report noted.
"Younger abusers more often resort to penetration in secluded spaces or hideaways. Middle-aged abusers are prone to a greater variety of types and locations of abuse. Much older abusers resort to forms of abuse in the confessional which do not involve bodily contact," the report said.
The largest number of abuse cases happened between 1960 and 1990 (58.3%), while another 21.9% of the cases took place from 1991 to 2020, according to the report.
Most of the abuse took place when the victims were in early adolescence, between the ages of 10 and 14; their current average age is 52 years-old. Most of the alleged victims were male (57.2%), though 42.2% were female, the report said.
More than half of the victims (57.2%) said the abuse occurred on more than one occasion; in 27.5% of cases, it lasted "for more than a year," according to the report.
The report added that 77% of victims never made a complaint about the abuse to church officials and only 4.3% went to the police.
"It is noteworthy that in the period following the abuse there was no external response: for 65.8% of cases, nothing was done to remove the abuser," the report said.
The head of the Portuguese Bishops Conference, Bishop José Ornelas, called the abuse "an open wound that hurts and embarrasses us."
"We ask forgiveness from all the victims: those who courageously gave their testimony, silent for so many years, and those who still live with their pain in the depths of their hearts, without sharing it with anyone," Ornelas said during a news conference, the Catholic News Agency reported.
Bishops are expected to convene in March to discuss the report's findings and plan a response.
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