The Archdiocese of San Francisco announced Monday, June 29, that it had reached an agreement to pay $395 million to approximately 530 victims of sexual violence committed by members of its clergy, to put an end to their legal proceedings.
This violence against minors, which often dates back several decades, has long been prescribed, until California passed a law giving a three-year window for victims to come forward and initiate proceedings, between the beginning of 2020 and the end of 2022, for acts that are however old. The agreement “opens the way to fair compensation for survivors who have borne the weight of this abuse all their lives,” said the Archbishop of San Francisco, Monsignor Salvatore Cordileone, in a press release.
A California law that changes everything
“We take full responsibility for what happened, and I offer my sincere apologies to all those who were harmed,” he added, referring to the “moral obligation” of the Catholic Church to provide a response to its crimes. This financial agreement must still be approved by a vote of the victims, before being validated by a judge.
“Today, the shame will change sides,” reacted one of the victims, Margie O’Driscoll, sexually assaulted almost 50 years ago in a Catholic school. “Like all survivors, I carried this pain and this shame like a ball and chain for a very, very long time,” she insisted during a press conference, recalling all the years where the victims were “despised by the archdiocese”.
Beyond millions, concrete guarantees
“The deepest suffering is that of those who died while this case dragged on, without their names ever being mentioned in court or receiving an apology from the archbishop,” she recalled. Jeff Anderson, one of the lawyers representing many of the victims, welcomed a “major step forward”, emphasizing that beyond financial compensation, the agreement forces the archdiocese to introduce 14 measures to “protect children and empower survivors”.
The institution will notably have to hire an independent consultant to whom it will give access to all its archives, responsible for producing a report on the violence committed. A partial list of perpetrators of abuse must also be published, and a hotline for reporting future sexual violence must be created. The Catholic Church is facing scandals of sexual violence committed by its clergy all over the world. Their management varies greatly depending on the country: in Spain for example, where Pope Leo XIV visited at the beginning of June, the Church is still widely criticized for its opacity on the issue.
