Boys in a Famous German Catholic Choir Suffered Constant Abuse for Decades
By Hemant Mehta, July 23, 2019

The Regensburger Domspatzen is the oldest boys’ choir in the world, having been founded in 976 (not a typo). It’s the official choir for Regensburg Cathedral in the German state of Bavaria, and the kids in it attend a special boarding school with an emphasis on music. Until 1994, the choir was run by Georg Ratzinger, the brother of the former pope.

A few years ago, the choir made worldwide headlines for all the wrong reasons when it was revealed that at least 547 members of the choir, between 1945-1992, were “physically or sexually abused.”

The report said 547 boys at the Domspatzen’s school “with a high degree of plausibility” were victims of physical or sexual abuse, or both. It counted 500 cases of physical violence and 67 of sexual violence, committed by a total of 49 people.

At the choir’s preschool, “violence, fear and helplessness dominated” and “violence was an everyday method,” it said.

Ratzinger said he hit the boys, but he wasn’t aware of any sexual abuse. (I guess it runs in the family.)

Since that time, there’s been a lot of legal wrangling over how to deal with the abuse, leading to 376 victims being paid a total of 3.785 million euros as compensation (so far).

Two studies were also commissioned by the Catholic Church to dig into what happened and if the abuse could’ve been prevented. Those studies have now been released and their contents are as damning as the original claims.

(snip)

What happened in the boys’ choir is very similar to the kind of abuse that we know occurred in the Catholic Church writ large. The Church leaders, as usual, allowed the abuse to occur and did nothing to prevent it. And the Church was so insulated from the outside world that third parties couldn’t observe what was happening themselves.

No wonder no alarms were sounded for decades.