<\/p>\n Ciro de Luca \/ Pool via REUTERS<\/p>\n
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Spanish media said the pope would speak later on Monday with victims at the Vatican embassy in Madrid, formally known as the apostolic nunciature. <\/p>\n
Ahead of the meeting, representatives of some victim groups complained that they were being excluded. <\/p>\n
“We are disappointed that the pope, instead of listening to a sufficiently large and solid representation of victims, prefers to leave us out,” Juan Cuatrecasas, spokesman for the association Infancia Robada (Stolen Childhood), told AFP. <\/p>\n
“We are going to keep pushing until the end, insisting that the Pope has to see us, has to hear us, we have a voice,” he said, speaking outside the nunciature. <\/p>\n
The Vatican has said that a meeting will take place during the visit but that it would not give further information until after it has taken place out of “respect for the victims.”<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters on the flight to Madrid on Saturday, Leo, 70, said the scandal of sexual violence was “still an open wound” for the Church. <\/p>\n
Around 200,000 minors are estimated to have suffered sexual violence by clergy in Spain since 1940, according to a 2023 report from Spain’s national ombudsman. <\/p>\n
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s government and the Catholic Church in Spain signed an agreement in March to compensate victims, after years of reticence from the Church hierarchy.<\/p>\n
Unprecedented speech<\/h2>\n
The US-born pope earlier on Monday gave an unprecedented speech to the Spanish parliament, which was welcomed with a lengthy standing ovation from lawmakers. <\/p>\n
The leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics called for a global response to the “tragic drama” of migration and said world peace was a “true global imperative.”<\/p>\n
The pope also urged lawmakers to defend life “from conception to its natural end”, in a country whose left-wing government has legalized euthanasia under strict conditions and wants to include abortion rights in its constitution. <\/p>\n
He called for “safe and legal pathways” for immigration and for migrants to be given “a respectful welcome and real opportunities for integration”. <\/p>\n
In contrast with many of his European allies, Sanchez has a relatively liberal immigration policy. <\/p>\n
But the government is under pressure on the issue from the main conservative Popular Party and from far-right party Vox, now the nation’s third-largest political force. <\/p>\n
The pope’s seven-day visit to Spain will include a trip to the Canary Islands, where he will pay tribute to the migrants who have lost their lives at sea on perilous journeys from Africa. <\/p>\n
The Spanish archipelago has become one of the main entry points for migrants who enter Europe without permission.<\/p>\n
The pope, who like Sanchez has been harshly criticized by President Trump for his anti-war views, also called for “patient dialogue” instead of conflict and rearmament in Europe and beyond. <\/p>\n
“Weapons may impose a temporary silence but they can never build a genuine and lasting peace,” he said. <\/p>\n
The speech came a day after the pope celebrated an open-air mass in central Madrid that was attended by more than 1.5 million people. <\/p>\n
On Wednesday, the pope will bless the new tower of the Sagrada Familia Basilica in Barcelona — a still-unfinished masterpiece by revered architect Antoni Gaudi that recently became the world’s tallest church. <\/p>\n
The visit will conclude on Thursday and Friday in the Canary Islands, where the pope will be joined by Sanchez.<\/p>\n
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