ABSTRACT
Most of the victims of both sexual and non-sexual ecclesial abuses in Latin America claim that what is still owed to them is truth, recognition, justice, and reparation by a representative institutional body. Some expect that instance to be the State, others, the Catholic Church itself. The insistence on prevention and guarantees of non-repetition is almost transversal in the current discourse of the Latin-American Church. However, very few countries in our continent have even considered establishing institutional instances of reparation. This contribution intends to establish the definitions of reparation and restorative justice, committing to the importance of truth, recognition, and justice, in the face of the trauma perpetrated by these specific violations to human integrity. Furthermore, this chapter delves into the issue of the urgent need – for the victim and society as a whole – for institutionally mandated instances of truth, recognition, and justice that lead to authentic attainable reparation.
