Pope Calls for ‘change of Mindset’ to Address Clergy Abuse Crisis: Report

By Kim Chatelain
The Times-Picayune
January 3, 2019

https://www.nola.com/news/2019/01/pope-calls-for-change-of-mindset-to-address-clergy-abuse-crisis-report.html

Pope Francis, right, salutes Chicago Archbishop Blase Joseph Cupich in St. Peter's Square at the Vatican on Sept. 2, 2015. Pope Francis, in a letter addressed to U.S. bishops meeting in Mundelein, Ill., on Thursday, Jan. 3, 2019, is encouraging bishops to unify as the Catholic church deals with a "crisis of credibility" stemming from the clergy sex abuse scandal. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino) (Alessandra Tarantino, File))

Pope Francis has called on Roman Catholic bishops in the United States to restore the church’s credibility, which has been left in tatters by a bourgeoning clergy abuse crisis, the Catholic News Agency reported.

In a letter dated Jan. 1 and released Thursday (Jan. 3) by the U.S. bishops’ conference, the pope insisted upon a “change of mindset” to help renew trust in the Catholic church.

“Clearly a living fabric has come undone, and we, like weavers, are called to repair it,” the pope wrote in the letter that was sent ahead of the U.S. bishops’ weeklong retreat at Mundelein Seminary, in the Archdiocese of Chicago.

The repair process must involve a “change of mindset” by bishops in relation to prayer, power, exercising authority, and handling money, the pontiff explained, with the change rooted in an acknowledgment of the “sinfulness and limitations” which necessitate God’s grace.

Acknowledging that the abuse scandals have diminished the credibility of the Church in the U.S., the pope said that a cover-up mentality “enabled them to fester and cause even greater harm to the network of relationships that today we are called to heal and restore,” the news agency reported.