UNITED STATES
Christian Catholicism
Jerry Slevin
Pope Francis surprised many today by his following unexpected remarks about the priest child abuse scandal. He stated:
“I feel compelled to personally take on all the evil which some priests, quite a few in number, obviously not compared to the number of all the priests, to personally ask for forgiveness for the damage they have done for having sexually abused children. The Church is aware of this damage, it is personal, moral damage carried out by men of the Church, and we will not take one step backward with regards to how we will deal with this problem, and the sanctions that must be imposed. On the contrary, we have to be even stronger. Because you cannot interfere with children.”
A short video of Pope Francis’ above remarks, along with the circumstances of, and some reactions to, the remarks are included here:
Francis has served in a major city for over a quarter century as either a bishop or a Jesuit provincial, and over a dozen years as a cardinal. He must know the score on the Vatican’s long standing failure to hold bishops’ accountable for protecting predatory priests. He then would also know the Vatican has never really taken a step forward, so it is impossible to take a step backward here.
Will Francis in fact now take a step forward and hold bisops accountable — that is the fundamental issue he has been ducking for over a year as pope. He has finally announced recently in general terms an advisory commission with a vague mandate and neither a specific schedule nor a clear agenda. Meanwhile, Francis recently in effect approved of permitting Italian priests to continue to avoid reporting abuse cases to the police.
Francis volunteered to be Pope. As part of the control group now, he like the ex-Pope and Cardinals Bertone, Sodano, Levada, Parolin and Mueller are all subject to the long arm of the International Criminal Court. The Court merely deferred taking action for now; a prosecution of Vatican leaders remains legally feasible. Moreover, the Vatican remains subject to the UN committee on children under the treaty the Vatican is bound by. Francis is running out of time.
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