three monks of the Montserrat Abbey have been accused of pederasty till the date. But only one of them will be tried for his crimes: the brother gabriel. Instruction that has been carried out in a Court of Manresa against this cleric, the only one of the three religious with crimes not prescribed, has already ended. According to sources consulted by EL PERIÓDICO, the prosecution requests a sentence of 5 years in jail and the private accusationfor his part, asks that he be sentenced to 6 years of imprisonment. Both parties, who demand the opening of the oral trial against brother Gabriel, consider that this religious should economically repair the victim, while the public prosecutor stresses that the abbey has to answer subsidiarily.
The two accusations also believe that the monk, whose real name is James S.had a great influence on the victim, for whom he was a “personal” and “spiritual” guide“. The religious, they point out in their writings, took advantage of this condition of superiority and also, they point out, he used alcohol to persuade the minor – who was 16 years old and was still teetotal – and to be able to sexually abuse him.
The only one of the three
The first monk accused of pedophilia in the abbey was Andreu Soler. The activist Miguel Hurtado revealed his abuse in an interview with EL PERIÓDICO published in January 2019. To weather this storm, Montserrat promoted a internal commission. Before the end of 2019, he presented his conclusions. The working group that carried it out stressed that Soler behaved for decades like a predator –this newspaper came to count 9 different victims– and also reported that, with its inquiries, it had been made aware of two other victims of a second monk. The initials of this second cleric are VTM, who abused two minors in 1968 and left the religious order in 1980.
Both the abuses of Solerwho also died in 2008, like those of the second monk were prescribed and none of them had to face any judicial process for these crimes. Brother Gabriel, the third monk accused of pedophilia, however, will be tried for his abuse. The events occurred in May 2019 and the victim reported them two years later, in June 2021.
Coordinator of Montserrat Jove
In May 2019, brother Gabriel I was 39 years old and was vice chancellor of the Sanctuary of Montserrat and one of the coordinators of Montserrat Jove, an initiative that consists of organizing two annual meetings for 40 minors who come to the monastery to reflect. On one of those days she met the victim. A closer relationship was generated between the two and Gabriel became someone of the adolescent’s maximum confidence.
Within the framework of that friendship, Gabriel invited the victim to spend a weekend at the abbey, between May 3 and 5. Gabriel paid for a room for the minor out of his pocket and allegedly abused him, after getting him drunk, for two consecutive nights, according to the complaint to the Mossos d’Esquadra. To overcome his resistance, he used a bottle of cava that the minor himself had given him. It was a gift from his parents, who thus thanked Gabriel for an invitation to help their son cope with some problems and doubts that afflicted the victim, such was the degree of trust that the adolescent’s family, and the boy himself, had deposited in Gabriel.
Parallel abuses to the commission
The reported sexual abuse therefore occurred within the Abbey premises and, curiously, while the aforementioned commission to clarify the abuses of the first monk, Andreu to usually do.
To perpetrate the abuses, brother Gabriel used, according to the accusations, a position of superiority that facilitated his contact with minors, as Soler and the other pedophile cleric had done in the past. The first did it from his position at the head of the school -the liturgical choir-, the second as the head of the escort group of ‘Els Nois de Servei’, and brother Gabriel, the third, thanks to the meetings of Montserrat Jove.
He Court of Manresa that instructs the complaint collected by the Mossos summoned brother Gabriel to testify in autumn 2021. According to judicial sources consulted by this newspaper, the monk admitted sexual contact in court with the minor but maintained that the two meetings they shared were consented to. In Spain the minimum age to consent to a sexual relationship is 16 years.
Sanctuary Vice Chancellor
Brother Gabriel started the novitiate in 2004 and in 2010 he made a solemn commitment to the monastic organization. Between 2012 and 2017 she studied Church history in Rome and started a doctorate which in 2021 was about to end. In 2017 he was ordained as a deacon. In 2018 he was appointed vice-rector of the Sanctuary of Montserrat.
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A spokesman for the abbey has explained to EL PERIÓDICO that Gabriel continues to be part of the community but has stressed that he currently does not maintain contact with minors.
In 2013 he was chosen to star in the chapter that the series ‘Youth with VAT’ of the Jordi Pujol Study Center dedicated to the abbey. On his condition as a monk, he said this: “Not having married, not having a family, is not a burden for me. It is a life choice and you have to be consistent. And if it really is a life choice that comes from you, what is Honestly, you don’t have the feeling of having given up on your life either”. According to the victim, the monk insisted that the vows did not prevent her from having sexual relations – false – and that they only prohibited her from getting married.