Pope condemns “atrocities” of child sex abuse in Catholic churches
Pope Francis has reacted to a report last week that some priests were found to be engaging in child sex abuse within the Catholic church in the United States.
A report detailing alleged criminal activities of child sex abuse within the Roman Catholic church and indicting several priests had been submitted by the 40th Statewide Investigating Grand Jury about a week ago.
The grand jury, in the report, said it was able to investigate activities of child sex abuse in six dioceses in Pennsylvania.
The comprehensive report named no lesser than 300 offending priests, and it was discovered that over 1000 child victims – mostly boys – were manipulated with alcohol or pornography.
Some of the victims were made to masturbate, while some were raped orally, vaginally, and anally.
The sinister acts by the priests were discovered to have been covered up by the church for a long time.
Pope Francis said in a letter made public by the Vatican on Monday (today) that “We have realised that these wounds never disappear and that they require us forcefully to condemn these atrocities and join forces in uprooting this culture of death.”
Quoting a Gospel passage that says “If one member suffers, all suffer together,” Pope Francis added: “(Those words) forcefully echo in my heart as I acknowledge once more the suffering endured by many minors due to sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience perpetrated by a significant number of clerics and consecrated persons.
“With shame and repentance, we acknowledge as an ecclesial community that we were not where we should have been, that we did not act in a timely manner, realizing the magnitude and the gravity of the damage done to so many lives. We showed no care for the little ones; we abandoned them,” he wrote.
