IRELAND
The Irish Times
August 28, 2018
By Colin Gleeson Thurles
Senior cleric coy on whether allowing priests to marry might solve shortage of priests
A senior cleric has insisted the Catholic Church will follow up Pope Francis’ apology to victims of clerical abuse with “concrete actions” to ensure children are protected and perpetrators are held to account.
Some 55 per cent of Irish people believe Pope Francis “did not go far enough” when he addressed the issue of child sex abuse in the Catholic Church on his visit to the Republic last week, according to an opinion poll in The Irish Times.
Cardinal John Dew, Archbishop of Wellington, New Zealand, has said Pope Francis did “extremely well” in his handling of the clerical abuse issue during his 36-hour visit.
“I thought he did extremely well to address it at the beginning of the mass at Phoenix Park. He was up front about it. He apologised for it.”
Cardinal Dew, who was speaking to The Irish Times on the fringes of a pastoral conference on “the future of the Irish parish” in Thurles, Co Tipperary, also addressed criticism that the Pope failed to outline concrete actions to be taken.
“It’s hard to know what people actually want,” he said. “But I think now that people have been speaking about this, I’m sure there will be. I’m sure there will be some concrete actions taken.
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