100 allege abuse at Bavarian Benedictine abbey

CWN - April 13, 2010

One hundred former students of a Benedictine abbey school in Bavaria have alleged that they were physically or sexually abused by 15 monks.

“My investigations quite clearly show that for decades up until around 1990, children and adolescents were brutally, sadistically tormented and also sexually abused in the Ettal monastery,” said special investigator Thomas Pfister, whose inquiry was launched in February by the abbey and the Archdiocese of Munich and Friesing.

Richter emphasized that today’s Ettal Abbey is far different from the Ettal Abbey of the time in which the abuse took place.

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  • Posted by: R. Spanier (Catholic Canadian) - Apr. 13, 2010 1:00 PM ET USA

    Children and adolescents? The truth is that the abuse allegations concern boys abused by males. According to the Deutsche Welle "Pfister said 100 boys may have been victims in Ettal alone." http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,5326920,00.html

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