Alejandra Pereyra, 44, said she felt she had been “touched by the hand of God” after receiving the phone call from Pope Francis.
Pereyra wrote to the Pope, who was archbishop of Buenos Aires before being elected pontiff in March, about 10 days ago. She said that after she had been raped by a policeman, Argentinean authorities tried to suppress her complaint and that the perpetrator had received a promotion.
She was amazed to hear from the 76-year-old Pope personally when he called her on Sunday using a landline from the Vatican.
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“My mobile phone rang and when I asked who it was, he responded, ’The Pope’,” Pereyra told an Argentinean television network. “I just froze.”
“The Pope listened to what I said with much attention,” she said. “He told me that I was not alone and that I must have faith in the justice system.”
The Pope “told me that he receives thousands of letters a day but that the one that I wrote had touched his heart,” Pereyra added.
She said she would “do everything possible” to travel to Rome to meet the Pope in person.
“He said he would receive me,” said Pereyra, who comes from Rio Segundo, located about 450 miles northwest of Buenos Aires.
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