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A former high-ranking clergyman had for years been aware of the abuse of a young boy by a Swiss friar. Fr Ephrem Bucher says he feared that the perpetrator, a lifetime friend, would commit suicide if he was reported.
Daniel Pittet's Mon père, je vous pardonne (Father, I forgive you), published by Philippe Rey, 230 p.
Switzerland's Catholic bishops made headlines last December when they set up a special compensation fund for clergy sex abuse victims whose cases were many years old and beyond the statute of limitations.
At the time, all eleven members of the Swiss Bishops' Conference, representatives of the religious orders, and a delegation of victims gathered for a penitential service in the Valère Basilica in Sion.
"For far too long the Church turned a blind eye on these victims who have not been received any reparation," said conference president Bishop Charles Morerod.
"A grievous sin committed by individual members of the Church has come to light and it was facilitated by certain patterns of behavior and thinking in the Church," he said as his confreres knelt in prayer.
"The sin has several levels: the abusive act, the complicit silence and the failure to render assistance to the victims. We feel responsible and thank the victims for opening our eyes," the bishop concluded.
Then on 13 February, a man named Daniel Pittet published an autobiography in which he relates the horror of being sexually abused as a young boy for years in the late 1960s and early 1970s by a Swiss Capuchin friar named Fr Joèl Allaz.
Significantly, the book has a very moving preface by Pope Francis whom Pittet visited in 2015 and who encouraged the man to publish his experiences.
But just four days after the book was published the former provincial superior of Capuchins in Switzerland, Fr Bucher, admitted he had spent years hushing up the Pittet case. Fr Bucher said he had known Fr Allaz since they were both young and had always feared that if he reported him to the authorities, Allaz would commit suicide.
Fr Bucher was superior of the Swiss Capuchins from 2001-2004 and again from 2007 -2013. When Church officials in Switzerland were alerted of the Allaz case in 1989, Bucher transferred him to France.
There Fr Allaz abused his own nephew and another child and in 2012. He received a two-and-a-half year suspended sentence by a court in Grenoble, whereupon Bucher brought him back to Switzerland.
The Swiss Church has never reported Allaz to the authorities. Aged 76 he now lives in a Capuchin monastery in German-speaking part of the country.
Just a few months ago the Swiss Bishops' Conference appointed Fr Bucher to its new clergy sexual abuse commission as an expert on clergy pedophilia. The seven-member commission advises the bishops on the psychological, legal, moral, theological and church-political aspects of clergy pedophilia.
But after admitting to moving Fr Allaz from diocese to diocese and hushing up his abuse, Fr Bucher has now resigned from the commission.
"When he was appointed to the commission, we were not aware of how far he was involved in the patchy investigation of Fr Joel's case," Bishop Morerod said February 17th in the Swiss daily Blick.
In the preface to Pittet's book – published in French, Italian and Polish – Pope Francis writes:
"How can a priest at the service of Christ and his Church cause so much harm? … Some of the victims have been driven to suicide. Their deaths weigh on my heart, on my conscience and that of the whole Church. I humbly ask their families for forgiveness.
"And I thank Daniel because testimony like his breaks down the wall of silence that covered scandals and suffering, shedding light on a terrible and dark area in the life of the Church…"
The Capuchins' current provincial superior in Switzerland, Fr Agostino Del Pietro, has deplored that officials in his order did not report the Allaz case to the Swiss authorities once they learned of it.
"In church circles at the time it was thought that the problem could be solved by moving the priest to another parish," Fr Del Pietro said.
He said the Capuchins now intend to have the case investigated by an independent commission.
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