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Vatican City, Holy See | AFP | Wednesday 3/29/2023 The most influential member of a Vatican commission on tackling clerical sex abuse has quit, its leader said Wednesday, in the latest blow to a papal advisory body dogged by controversy. Hans Zollner, the public face of Pope Francis’s efforts to tackle the global paedophilia scandal, has resigned due to a heavy workload, the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors said. “The commission has been […]
by AFP eastern Congo correspondents Agence France-Presse GOMA, DR Congo (AFP) — Pope Francis made repeated appeals for peace during his landmark trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo this week, but there was no let-up in fighting in the east. Putting an end to violence was a dominant theme of the pontiff’s visit to Africa’s largest Catholic country, where he arrived on Tuesday and was to depart for South Sudan on Friday. Dozens of […]
MASKWACIS, Canada (AFP) — Some seemed far away, others wept or applauded: a great wave of emotion swept through the crowd on Monday in western Canada’s Maskwacis when the pope himself begged forgiveness for the “evil” done to Indigenous people. One way or another, they had all been affected by the decades of abuse against children in schools run by the Catholic Church, part of a system seeking to stamp out the Indigenous identity […]
by Clement Melki and Amel Semmache Agence France Presse Pope Francis on Monday apologized for the “evil” inflicted on the Indigenous peoples of Canada on the first day of a visit focused on addressing decades of abuse at Catholic-run residential schools. The plea for forgiveness from the leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics was met with applause by a crowd of First Nations, Metis and Inuit people in Maskwacis, in western Alberta province […]
by Alice RITCHIE / Ella IDE Agence France Presse VATICAN CITY (AFP) — Ex-pope Benedict XVI asked for forgiveness Tuesday for clerical child sex abuse committed on his watch, but aides rejected allegations of a cover-up while he was archbishop of Munich. “I can only express to all the victims of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness,” the 94-year-old said in a letter published by the […]
by Femke COLBORNE Agence France Presse BERLIN, Germany (AFP) — A potentially explosive report into the handling of child sex abuse in the Catholic Church will on Thursday be published in Germany, with former pope Benedict XVI among those in the spotlight. The report by law firm Westpfahl Spilker Wastl (WSW) will analyse how abuse cases were dealt with in the archdiocese of Munich and Freising between 1945 and 2019. The Munich archdiocese, which […]
VATICAN CITY (AFP) — Pope Francis on Wednesday expressed his personal shame and that of the Church at the sexual abuse of children by French Catholic clergy, after the scale of the problem was laid bare in a devastating report. “I wish to express to the victims my sadness and pain for the trauma they have suffered,” he said during his weekly audience at the Vatican. “And also my shame, our shame, my shame […]
The Catholic Church’s Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, whose conviction for shielding an alleged child-molesting priest was overturned on appeal last month, the Catholic church in Lyon said Friday. Barbarin, who will now step down as Archbishop of Lyon, was given a six-month suspended jail sentence last March for not reporting a priest in his diocese who had allegedly abused dozens of boy scouts in the 1980s and 1990s. […]
ROME, Italy (AFP) — Former nuns “abandoned” by the Catholic Church, including some who became prostitutes to survive, have been sheltered at a Vatican residence for more than a year, a Brazilian cardinal said. Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz confirmed the house’s existence at an undisclosed location in Vatican City during an interview for the February issue of the Vatican’s magazine Women Church World. In the wide-ranging interview about women’s roles in the church, […]
by Catherine MARCIANO Agence France Presse VATICAN CITY (AFP) — Catholic bishops gathered at a special Vatican assembly will vote Saturday on whether to recommend to Catholic Church’s Pope Francis to open the priesthood to married men or create female deacons, issues that are taboo for traditionalists. The ballot comes at the close of a three-week “synod” on the Pan-Amazonian region which highlighted the challenges facing the region, from the destruction of the rainforest to […]
by Catherine MARCIANO Agence France Presse VATICAN CITY (AFP) — An idea to fill empty pulpits in remote locations by allowing married men to become priests is bitterly dividing a Vatican assembly, with critics warning the emotive issue could fracture the Catholic Church. The hot-button topic of whether an exception can be made to the centuries-old custom of celibacy in places where there is a shortage of priests has dominated the start of the three-week […]
Catholic Church’s Pope Francis officially accepted on Thursday the resignation of New York’s Bishop John Jenik, who has been accused of sexually abusing a teenager. Jenik was suspended in 2018 pending a Church investigation into the alleged assault, which reportedly took place in the 1980s while the American was pastor of a Bronx parish. “Although the alleged incidents occurred decades ago, the Lay Review Board has concluded that the evidence is sufficient to find […]
