Spain: Ombudsman tasked with probing church sex abuse record

MADRID (AP) — Spanish parliamentarians are tasking the country’s ombudsman with the first official investigation into the depth of sexual abuse committed by members of Spain’s Roman Catholic church. All lawmakers except for members of a far-right party that holds roughly 15% of the seats in Spain’s Congress of Deputies, or lower house, backed the proposal introduced by socialists and a Basque nationalist party. Thursday’s vote was momentous on the back of increasing public harrowing accounts of abuse and an admission of the problem by some Catholic orders and bishops. The Spanish Episcopal Conference, which for years rejected being investigated, last month announced it would task a private law firm with a year-long “audit” into past and present sexual abuse.