By Elizabeth Pineau and Manuel Ausloos
LOCTUDY, France, Sept 22 (Reuters) - Ghislaine Magoarou, 65, was 9 years old when her teacher, Brother Gabriel Girard, pulled shut the curtains of their classroom in a fishing town in northwest France and raped her.
That incident marked the start of a months-long cycle of abuse at the now-shuttered Catholic school that eventually led Magoarou to attempt suicide by throwing herself into the sea.
"I had gone swimming with friends and simply let myself sink," Magoarou
recalled during a walk along the beach in Loctudy with three other survivors. "I let the waves carry me away, and I had absolutely no desire to come back up. I felt at peace in the water, as if I were being cleansed."
POPE DUE TO MEET FRENCH SURVIVORS
Magoarou is one of at least 330,000 French minors who were abused between 1950 and 2020 by priests, religious figures, or laypeople working in Church institutions. Those figures were revealed in a landmark 2021 report that found France's Catholic Church had ignored the issue for far too long.
Pope Leo will seek to redress some of that harm during a visit to France, when he will meet next Sunday with seven victims of Church sexual abuse in Lourdes, some of those involved said in a press release.
During a visit to Spain in June, in which he met Spanish survivors of clerical abuse, Leo told bishops they must listen to survivors and offer them reparations.
In meeting with survivors, Leo is carrying on the work of his predecessor, Pope Francis. He took steps to address clerical abuse, although some groups have criticised them as insufficient.
Girard abused an estimated 50 to 70, 8-to-9-year-olds at the school in Loctudy, a pretty seaside town in Brittany, from 1969 until 1972. Survivors recounted how he would summon a child to the front of the class and abuse them while ordering the rest of the class to keep their heads down.
He died in 1979, by which time he had assaulted an estimated 170 children across France, without ever facing justice.
The Frères de Saint-Gabriel, the religious congregation that operated the school, did not respond to a request for comment. It has previously recognised and condemned all acts of physical and sexual abuse committed by its members, including Girard.
HOPES FOR LASTING CHANGE
Magoarou, who met Pope Francis at the Vatican in 2023, said she could "almost forgive" Girard as "there was something wrong with him", but still struggled to understand the other adults who had enabled or turned a blind eye to his actions.
Fellow survivor Michèle Le Reun-Gaigné said her life was ruined by Girard's abuse, leading to her dropping out of school and losing faith in adults. Still, she remained optimistic that she and others like her could help engender a change in how the Church handles such cases.
"Change won't happen overnight; we might not even live to see it," she said. "But what we are trying to do, in our own modest way, is to lay down small stepping stones to try and improve things, especially for future generations."
Alain Esquerre, 66, a spokesperson for victims at the Notre-Dame de Bétharram Catholic institution, said he wanted a genuine mea culpa from the Pope and the Church.
"I believe Leo bears the immense responsibility of 'declaring enough is enough' - of putting a stop to this so that children across the globe will no longer be raped by priests," he said.
NEW COMPENSATION MECHANISM UNDER SCRUTINY
The 2021 report by the Independent Commission on Sexual Abuse in the Church led to the creation of the Independent National Body for Recognition and Reparation (INIRR), which offers compensation of up to €60,000 for victims of abuse.
Over five years, 1,969 victims contacted INIRR, according to INIRR President Marie Derain de Vaucresson. Both Magoarou and Le Reun-Gaigné were among those who received a payout.
The French Bishops' Conference says the INIRR will cease operations on October 1, after which previously undeclared victims will have to contact local parishes to seek compensation, recognition and support.
The Bishops' Conference has described the new system, in which victims' first point of contact would be the local parish, as a continuation of its efforts to compensate people who have been abused.
Ampaseo, a victims' association, said the new scheme lacks the independence and judicial oversight that made the previous system a success.
"How could victims entrust their journey to an institution that failed in its duty of protection?" it said in a statement.
Véronique Margron, 68, a Dominican theologian who has supported many victims of clerical abuse, said she hoped Leo would mandate obligatory processes across the entire Church to aid victims in speaking out, adding that highlighting abuse was particularly difficult in Africa or India.
"All victim advocacy groups say - and rightly so - that not enough is being done," she said. "The response must be systemic."
(Reporting Elizabeth Pineau and Manuel Ausloos, writing by Gabriel Stargardter, Editing by Alex Richardson)
