“At present, the VITA Group has received 93 requests for financial compensation, with the latest arriving last week. We are currently scheduling interviews with these individuals, two of whom reside outside Portugal,” stated Rute Agulhas to journalists in Fátima, on the sidelines of the international congress “From Reflection to Action: The Role of the Catholic Church in Preventing and Responding to Sexual Violence,” which gathered 300 participants.
VITA Group, established by the Portuguese Episcopal Conference (CEP) to address sexual abuse cases within the Catholic Church, operates as an autonomous and independent entity, aiming to welcome, listen, support, and prevent sexual violence against children and vulnerable adults in the context of the Catholic Church.
“We are trying to coordinate schedules and waiting for individuals to come to us. Therefore, interviews are scheduled for December, close to Christmas, and also for January,” she added.
Regarding the timeline for this work, Rute Agulhas clarified that the CEP had recently committed to completing this process by early 2026.
However, the cases recently arriving, with interviews scheduled close to Christmas or early January, “will naturally not be ready by early January,” she noted, as each case needs to be analyzed and reviewed.
On November 13, the CEP announced that by that date, 89 requests for financial compensation had been submitted following abuses within the Catholic Church, with 78 considered valid.
The coordinator of VITA Group remarked that “validated does not necessarily mean they will receive compensation,” but that “they passed an initial evaluation phase that other cases did not, for example, due to involving abuses outside the Church or non-sexual abuses.”
“Thus, these 93 are still under review and study; in some cases, we are still waiting for information from the Church itself,” she added.
In this context, she indicated that there are also cases “allegedly involving Portuguese priests, but occurring outside Portugal,” which requires coordination with other dioceses and archdioceses, both in Portugal and with other episcopal conferences.
The coordinator of the VITA Group highlighted that “this takes time,” particularly when dealing with African countries.
Asked about the completion timeframe, Rute Agulhas responded that “clearly, this is not a process to drag on into 2026.”
“What is planned is that by the end of the year or the start of 2026, decisions can be made and the Portuguese Episcopal Conference can move to the next step of awarding compensation,” she added.
The head of the group stated that the VITA Group was not asked for a specific financial suggestion for compensations but rather for “a somewhat transnational analysis” to understand “what has happened in other countries.”
Cross-referencing this information with national jurisprudence, Rute Agulhas believes it will be possible to determine compensation amounts.
“I would not call them [amounts] fair, because truly fair, no amount can compensate for the harm experienced, but somehow there should be a kind of moral and ethical compensation, and that is the goal,” she added.
