A report by the Independent Investigation Commission in the Bavarian Diocese of Eichstätt corroborates serious allegations of cover-up against former bishop Alois Brems.
According to the report, the German former bishop not only covered up cases of abuse, but even helped a perpetrator to flee from the police.
"Despite the priest's numerous serious misconduct in the 1960s, which caused great suffering to his victims, he was not stopped in his criminal conduct," Bishop Gregor Maria Hanke, now in office, said of the report published on Thursday.
"The fact that these deeds were carried out and, moreover, actively covered up, is a shattering process that must be completely dealt with."
The legacy of Bishop Brems must be reassessed, Hanke said. "I also ask the municipalities and institutions that have honoured Bishop Brems to reconsider the commemoration of him on their part."
Brems was Bishop of Eichstätt in the German state of Bavaria from 1968 to 1983. He died in 1987.
The accusations against him had become known a few weeks ago. The man whose acts Brems is alleged to have covered up is a priest who died in 2016 and who is alleged not only to have abused girls in the 1960s, but to have assaulted them again decades later in a retirement home in Schwabach.
When he then moved from Schwabach to the archdiocese of Bamberg, the Eichstätt diocese did not "inform about the criminal past of the priest," the Eichstätt diocese announced.
"I must self-critically note that I should have reacted immediately after initial discussions from 2010," Hanke said. "I was not aware of the extent of the horror. That was a big mistake from which I have learned painfully."
