Professional Grade Abuse in the Latin American Church

This book addresses the crisis of sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church in Latin America, the region of the world with the highest percentage of Catholics. Bringing together research from across the continent, it demonstrates that abuse within the Church is indeed a global phenomenon, though abuses have taken different forms according to varying sociocultural contexts. With attention to abuses committed against children, women and vulnerable adults – by both men and women – within the settings of parishes, new religious movements and international religious organizations, it also raises questions of justice, asking how to assess the suffering of victims, how to deal with abusers and how to prevent abuses. It will therefore be of interest to scholars of religious studies, sociology, Latin American studies, criminology, theology, and religious leaders with interests in the abuses and scandals that have been revealed in the worldwide Church.

Véronique Lecaros is Professor in the Department of Theology at the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (PUCP).Ana Lourdes Suárez is a researcher at the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET)/National University of San Martin, Argentina.