Archabbot of St Peter's in Salzburg resigns in abuse scandal

Victims turned to Ombudsman, priest offers resignation

Salzburg - Salzburg, the Abbot Bruno Becker has offered because of sexual abuse 40 years ago of someone who was a minor at the time offered the competent religious superiors his resignation. Immediately after the crime he had sincerely apologised to the person concerned. He still regretted the incident profoundly and apologised profoundly, he said in a press release late Monday afternoon.

At the time the deed, he was 24 years old and not yet a priest. Since this unfortunate event and in all his pastoral work there had been no single incident of this kind either directed to this individual, or other persons, the cleric stressed.

Archbishop informed

After the election of the Abbot of St. Peter, the person concerned turned in the fall of 2009 to an ombudsman . In an meeting on 22 November 2009 in Vienna, where was also the ombudsman, and another confidant of the accuser were present, once again he asked those concerned to pardon him for the incident over 40 years ago and expressed his sincere remorse, the press release stated. The Abbot had been informed of this incident, including Archbishop Alois Kothgasser.

As reported, the Roman Catholic Church in Austria after the announcement of recent abuse cases has drawn some initial conclusions. In the Spring General Assembly in St. Polten in Austria of the Episcopal Conference a unified system of oversight has been commissioned, reported Cardinal Christoph Schönborn. A project is to develop proposals by the summer.

In the wake of reports of hundreds of abuse cases in Germany, it was revealed that in the previous year in Austria seventeen abuse cases have been started against Catholic schools and parishes in Austria. According to the spokesman of the Archdiocese of Vienna, Erich Leitenberger, there were 2009 in the Archdiocese of Vienna eight cases, two cases in each diocese of Graz, Innsbruck, St. Pölten and one each in Linz, Salzburg and Eisenstadt.

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