Documentary record Bound by Fear
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Other Christian institutions & contexts Catholic Zurich, Switzerland · 2023

Switzerland: University of Zurich pilot study finds 1,002 cases of abuse in the Catholic Church since 1950

Record class

Institutional event

Evidence status

Official finding

Authority role

clergy and religious of the Roman Catholic Church in Switzerland, mid-20th century to 2023

Organization

Historisches Seminar, Universität Zürich, Swiss Bishops' Conference

Spiritual nexus

The pilot study documents that priestly and religious authority over parishioners and institutional wards was the structural condition enabling the abuse it catalogued, and that church archival control had itself obstructed earlier discovery.

  • Pastoral or clerical authority
  • Institutional obedience or isolation

Evidence structure

Proceedings

  1. 2023-09-12 · commissioned independent pilot report

    Independent academic pilot study commissioned in 2022, University of Zurich. A team from the University of Zurich's Historical Seminar, led by Professors Monika Dommann and Marietta Meier, presented its final report on 12 September 2023 at a press conference in Zurich alongside Catholic Church representatives. The one-year pilot project, for which the church opened previously secret archives to researchers, identified 1,002 cases, 510 accused and 921 affected persons, spanning problematic boundary violations to severe, sustained systematic abuse. The study became UZH's most-covered press release of 2023.

Documented coercion mechanisms

  • priestly and religious pastoral authority
  • diocesan archival practices that the study found had concealed cases prior to the Church opening its secret archives for the research

Primary record

Sources

academic peer reviewed inquiry report Historisches Seminar, Universität Zürich, press release on the pilot study. German: summarises the study's scope, method and headline figures. English gloss: 'Pilot study on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church in Switzerland tops UZH's 2023 press releases.'

Primary institutional source from the researching university.

religious affiliated press background katholisch.de, 'Studie: 1.002 Missbrauchsfälle in katholischer Kirche der Schweiz.' German: reports the headline case, accused and victim figures. English gloss: 'Study: 1,002 abuse cases in the Catholic Church of Switzerland.'

Corroborating press report on the study's release.

national newspaper court reporting background SRF, 'Neue Pilotstudie: Missbrauch in römisch-katholischer Kirche — Studie zeigt Ausmass.' German: national broadcaster's report on the study's scale. English gloss: 'New pilot study: abuse in the Roman Catholic Church — study shows the scale.'

Corroborating national-broadcaster report.

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