Pope Leo XIV to meet abuse survivors in Latin America
Pope Leo XIV plans to meet survivors of abuse by clergy and other Church members during his November 6–17 journey to Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru. The Holy See Press Office said the meetings aim to express the Pope’s closeness, support paths to healing, and help ensure the Church is a safe place. The encounters follow similar meetings with survivors during Leo’s recent visits to Spain and France, where he stressed listening, prevention, truth, justice, and reparation. Meetings with abuse survivors have also been part of past papal journeys, and Leo has received survivors and advocacy representatives at the Vatican.
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Pope Leo XIV is scheduled to meet with survivors of clergy and other Church-related abuse during his Nov. 6–17 apostolic journey to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru. The Vatican says the meetings are intended to express the Pope’s closeness to survivors, support paths to healing and help ensure the Church is a safe and spiritually healthy place. 1 2 4
The Holy See Press Office said “several meetings are planned” with people who have experienced abuse by clergy or other members of the Church. It did not disclose how many encounters there will be, when or where they will occur, or how they will be conducted. 2 3 4
The Vatican described the purpose as working with survivors to build healing pathways accessible to those in need, while strengthening the Church’s safeguarding and its ability to live and communicate the Gospel. 1 2 4
The trip is to proceed as scheduled despite concerns raised by Leo’s Oct. 13 lung cancer surgery, according to the Associated Press report. 4
Leo has met with survivors during his recent trips to Spain and France. The Spain meeting took place privately in Madrid on June 8 with members of Proyecto Repara, an initiative of the archdiocese; it was disclosed afterward. 1 2 3
In Lourdes on Sept. 27, he held a two-hour meeting with survivors. The Vatican announced in advance that a meeting was planned for the France visit, unlike the Madrid encounter, which was made public after it occurred. 1 2 3
After the Lourdes meeting, Leo called for vigilance and determination in pursuing truth, justice, forgiveness and reparation, and for a culture of prevention and protection. He has also said sexual abuse is a human problem that, when it occurs in the Church, can deeply wound or destroy people’s faith. 1
Leo spent two decades as a missionary priest in Peru and, according to the AP, saw the effects of abuse on victims there. As the bishop designated by Peru’s bishops’ conference to hear from victims of the Sodalitium Christianae Vitae, he was later instrumental in Pope Francis’ 2025 decision to suppress the movement. 4
Argentina has also faced a reckoning over abuse, with victims pressing the Vatican to take action, including in cases in which Francis was personally involved, the AP reported. 4*
Ecclesial accountability, survivor healing, and prevention of clerical abuse
Ecclesial accountability, survivor healing, and prevention belong together: the Church cannot credibly seek healing while evading responsibility, and it cannot claim to have addressed past harm without taking practical steps to prevent its recurrence. Catholic teaching calls for listening to survivors, acknowledging harm, pursuing justice and reparation, and changing structures and practices that enabled abuse or concealment. These responsibilities belong not only to individual offenders but also to Church leaders and institutions wherever their decisions or failures contributed to harm.
Abuse by clergy is a grave violation of the trust and pastoral care entrusted to them. Its damage can extend beyond the person abused to family relationships and whole communities. Pope Francis describes the wounds as affecting victims, relatives, and the wider community, and says that no effort to ask pardon or repair harm can be considered sufficient in itself.
Accountability, then, is more than an expression of sorrow. It includes acknowledging what happened, accepting responsibility, responding through appropriate Church procedures, and complying with civil law. A 2011 Vatican circular directs bishops to establish procedures to assist victims, educate the community about protection, apply canon law, and meet civil-law requirements. It also says Church representatives should be prepared to listen to survivors and their families and to support their spiritual and psychological needs.
Pope Leo XIV connects justice with reform of ecclesial structures. He writes that the Church must purify relationships and structures distorted by inequality, lack of transparency, or abuse of power, and that listening to victims is part of a process involving acknowledgment, reparation, and prevention. He also recommends regular assessments of ministerial responsibilities as opportunities for learning and correction. This makes accountability an institutional responsibility, not merely a matter of an offender’s private repentance.
The Church’s response must also avoid concealment or minimization. In a 2019 address included in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, Pope Francis stated the determination that cases not be covered up or treated as insignificant, and called for continued purification, care for victims, and stronger formation. Apologies matter, but without truthful acknowledgment and concrete action they cannot by themselves restore trust.
Listening is not a symbolic courtesy; it is part of justice and healing. The Synod of Bishops says that listening to survivors requires special attention and sensitivity, and identifies it as fundamental to healing, repentance, justice, and reconciliation. It also calls the Church to acknowledge its shortcomings, ask forgiveness, care for victims, and take preventive measures.
“Every wounded person must be able to find sincere listening, welcome, protection and real paths to healing.”
Pope Leo’s words emphasize that healing must be made real in the Church’s response, not treated as a slogan. Survivors may need to be heard, believed, protected, and helped to make sense of what happened. Pope Francis recounts meeting survivors who sought answers and peace after abuse committed decades earlier; they wanted to be heard and understood, and the encounter helped them regain hope.
Healing is not necessarily quick, complete, or identical for every survivor. Nor should “reconciliation” be used to pressure someone to forgive, resume contact, or return to Church life on a timetable set by others. The cited Church teaching calls for listening, support, reparation, and real paths to healing; it does not make a survivor’s forgiveness or renewed relationship with the Church a precondition for care. The Church’s responsibility is to accompany survivors without making them responsible for resolving the institution’s discomfort or restoring its reputation.
Spiritual care can be important, but it must not displace psychological assistance or other appropriate support. The Vatican circular explicitly calls for both spiritual and psychological assistance. The Church’s pastoral response should therefore respect each survivor’s circumstances and choices rather than assuming that prayer, an apology, or a single meeting will suffice.
Prevention includes safeguarding practices, suitable procedures, and formation for those entrusted with responsibility. The 2011 circular describes educational programs intended to help parents and pastoral or school personnel recognize signs of abuse and respond appropriately. It also stresses careful discernment and healthy human and spiritual formation for future priests and religious, including formation in chastity and the responsibilities of clerical ministry.
Pope Francis likewise calls for rigorous preventive measures beginning with the selection and formation of people given responsibilities in education and leadership, together with the application of necessary actions and sanctions. Prevention is therefore not solely about excluding unsuitable candidates: the Holy See’s 2019 text also emphasizes positive, balanced formation for candidates who are accepted.
A prevention culture must also confront the conditions that let abuse persist or remain hidden. Pope Francis’s letter to the People of God calls for a culture that prevents both abuse and its concealment or perpetuation. Pope Leo’s emphasis on transparency and regular assessment points to a further implication: policies need to be examined in practice, and those exercising authority should be open to correction.
A Church response is credible when survivors encounter truthfulness, protection, meaningful assistance, and a willingness to address institutional failures—not merely public statements of regret. The Synod links rebuilding trust with humility, care for victims, and prevention, rather than treating trust as something the Church can demand.
The Catholic vision is thus neither despair nor easy reassurance. Pope Francis urges the Church to acknowledge its sins and pursue purification, while Pope Leo describes justice as including the repair of harm and action to prevent it from happening again. Survivor healing cannot be guaranteed by the institution, but the Church can either obstruct it through denial and pressure or serve it through listening, truth, justice, reparation, and sustained prevention.