Scottish Catholic Observer

The 34 bishops asked for forgiveness from abuse survivors as the unprecedented decision came.

“We want to announce that all bishops present in Rome, in writing, have placed our positions in the Holy Father’s hands so that he may freely decided regarding each one of us,” Bishop Juan Ignacio Gonzalez Errazuriz of San Bernardo said in a statement on May 18, according to Catholic Herald.

It is unclear yet as to whether the Pope will accept the resignations.

The BBC reported that the bishops were handed a 10-page document during the Vatican talks by Pope Francis, which accused the Church in Chile’s hierarchy of negligence in cases of sexual abuse, and that the bishops said that if the Pope chose not to accept their resignations, they would ‘continue doing our pastoral work’.

“In communion with (the Pope) we want to re-establish justice and contribute to repairing the damage caused,” they said.

Catholic News Service said that Auxiliary Bishop Fernando Ramos Perez of Santiago, who is the secretary general of the Bishops’ Conference of Chile, said the Holy Father read a document to the bishops gathered, saying that he ‘expressed his conclusions and reflections’ on the report that was compiled Archbishop Charles Scicluna of Malta and Fr Jordi Bertomeu, in their visit to Chile to investigate the abuse scandal.

“The pope’s text clearly showed a series of absolutely reprehensible acts that have occurred in the Chilean Church in relation to those unacceptable abuses of power, of conscience and sexual abuse that have resulted in the lessening of the prophetic vigour that characterised her,” said Bishop Ramos.