On May 14, Religión Digital published a statement signed by twelve victims of the Sodalicio de Vida Cristiana in defense of the Apostolic Commissioner, Mons. Jordi Bertomeu. The text, presented as a spontaneous manifestation from the group of victims, responded to a previous article by InfoVaticana that questioned certain aspects of the procedure followed by the pontifical delegate, including the illegal and surreal threat of excommunication (we repeat, excommunication) against two laypeople for daring to file a civil complaint against him, the untouchable commissioner. A milestone that will go down in the history of canon law as an absurd excess more fitting of some Renaissance tyrant.
A minimally attentive reading of the statement reveals, however, an operation of a very different nature from the one it seeks to convey: the public and nominal use of people in a situation of evident institutional vulnerability to defend the ecclesiastical official who manages their own reparation. And besides being improper, the maneuver is clumsy: the text contains too many elements that betray its true origin.
Four indications that the text does not originate from the victims
The first indication—and perhaps the most revealing—is the technical-canonical knowledge deployed in the writing. The statement cites precisely canon 331 of the Code of Canon Law, canons 34 to 39 on general decrees, canon 208 on the juridical equality of the faithful, Vo estis lux mundi, and distinguishes with ease between phases of investigation and reparation, between ordinary and extraordinary action of the Roman Pontiff, between suppression and liquidation. This is not the language of a victim: it is the language of a specialist.
That twelve people, residing in different countries and coming from heterogeneous life trajectories, coincide in drafting a text with this technical density is, simply, implausible.
The second indication is the nominal identification of adversaries that the victims, logically, do not know. The statement expressly mentions “Messrs. Tebas and Ariza” as responsible for the InfoVaticana article to which it responds. But Tebas and Ariza are not even columnists: they are businessmen whose relationship to the case is completely alien to the everyday universe of the Peruvian victims.
It is hardly credible that twelve victims of the Sodalicio would spontaneously handle those names, and even less so that they would place them at the center of a technical-canonical statement. On the other hand, they are known by the one who receives the criticisms directly: Mons. Bertomeu. The personalization of the adversary reveals too much.
The third indication—perhaps the most significant—is the absence among the signatories of historical figures in the case. José Enrique Escardó, the absolute pioneer in denouncing the Sodalicio since the year 2000 and the public voice of the victims for more than two decades, does not sign the statement. Nor do other historical victims with international relevance appear. Something has happened at the internal level that has evidenced that the Commissioner exceeds himself in his request to instrumentalize the victims.
The fourth indication is the very argumentative structure of the writing. A statement genuinely drafted by victims usually speaks of victims: of suffering, reparation, expectations, or needs. This text, on the other hand, revolves entirely around Bertomeu.
The central subject is not the signatories, but the defended official. The victims are reduced to an instrument legitimizing a questioned ecclesiastical authority. And when victims become a reputational resource for the one who administers their own reparation, the problem is no longer communicative: it is ethical.
A practice that is starting to seem like a method
The use of support statements as a mechanism for control or legitimation is not new in certain Peruvian ecclesiastical environments. Recently, a similar dynamic could be seen around Bishop Santarsiero, who was engaged in gathering public adhesions from priests in his diocese to gauge internal loyalties after being accused by two victims of serious sexual abuse. By the way, he remains at the head of the diocese without any measures or any communication to the victims.
The signature—or the refusal to sign—functioned as a marker of personal alignment within a hierarchical structure where everyone knows the consequences of standing out.
In the case of the Sodalicio, the problem is even more serious, because here we are not talking about incardinated priests but about victims of abuses whose reparation depends precisely on the authority in whose favor they are asked to position themselves publicly. The asymmetry is evident.
And when this type of practice starts to repeat itself, it can no longer be spoken of as isolated imprudences: it starts to seem like an institutional management methodology.
The core of the problem: exposing victims to defend the manager of their reparation
Even if the twelve signatories had given their consent freely—something that only they can assess—there is an elementary principle that any serious person responsible for victim care should know: the consent given by a victim in favor of the one who administers their reparation process can never be analyzed ignoring the existing dependency relationship.
The Apostolic Commissioner listens, evaluates testimonies, prioritizes actions, proposes measures, and administers assets intended for reparation. In that context, requesting—or simply accepting—that victims under his orbit appear publicly defending his management introduces a structural pressure incompatible with the most elementary standards of institutional prudence.
This has been understood for years by civil protocols for victim protection, data protection regulations when analyzing asymmetric relationships, and the very evolution of ecclesiastical praxis following Vo estis lux mundi.
To this is added another particularly delicate element: nominal exposure. Publicly associating specific names and surnames with the condition of victims of sexual, conscience, power, and economic abuses in a polemical text alien to their own reparation process constitutes a form of unnecessary and potentially revictimizing exposure.
And here appears the most serious contradiction of all: the statement claims that Bertomeu works for the “integral reparation” of the victims while simultaneously using them as a reputational shield against public criticisms. The form destroys the content.
Because if integral reparation includes dignity, autonomy, and protection against instrumentalizations—and it necessarily must include them—then this operation constitutes exactly the opposite of what is proclaimed.
Victims do not deserve to be placed publicly at the service of the reputational defense of the one who has the institutional duty to protect them. That a Commissioner wants to respond to criticisms about his management is legitimate. That he does so through disconnected articles from his spokesperson journalists may be questionable, but legitimate. What is profoundly improper and even illegal is to do so by placing the names and surnames of victims on the front line of a public battle that should never have involved them.
That decision is not only ethically questionable and legally delicate: it reveals an alarming lack of institutional judgment in someone whose main obligation should be precisely to avoid any form of victimization of the victims.