A new report alleges that the late Polish Pope John Paul II a.k.a Karol Wojtyla knew about child abuse in Poland’s Catholic Church even before taking over as pontiff. It further claims that the late Pope helped cover the litany of abuses. The report is based on an investigation by Michal Gutowski for Polish TV broadcaster TVN. Gutowski claims that the polish pope was aware of the cases of Paedophile priests within the church while still serving as a cardinal in Krakow. Reportedly, to avoid a scandal, he transferred the priests to other far-away dioceses.
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In 2015, he even wrote a letter of recommendation to Vienna Cardinal Franz Koenig for one of the priests abused of paedophilia. The letter made no mention of the abuse accusations.
John Paul II was pope for 27 years — from 1978 until his death in 2005.
During his investigation, Gutowski talked to victims of the alleged paedophile priests. He also talked to the victim’s families and former church diocese employees.
As proof, Gutowski, according to AFP, cites documents from former Communist-era SB secret police and rare church documents to which he managed to get access.
However, he was denied access to Krakow’s diocese. In the past, the Polish church has refused to provide records to the judiciary or police over cases of church abuse of minors.
One of Gutowski’s sources claimed to have in 1973 personally notified the former pope of acts of paedophilia. “Wojtyla first wanted to make sure it wasn’t a bluff,” claims the source.
The then cardinal reportedly told him to keep the information under wraps, saying “he would deal with it.”
Recent years have seen several reports of similar abuse of minors from the Polish church. Following the reports, especially in the past two years, several high-ranking church officials have been charged by the Vatican for covering up paedophilia by members of the clergy.
(With inputs from agencies)
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