Speaking to reporters on his tour of the Middle East on Tuesday, Pope Francis admitted that the Catholic church had an issue, and the roots lay in society “seeing women as second class”.
The Pope for the first time acknowledged sexual abuse of Catholic nuns by priests and bishops, quoted as saying, “Pope Benedict (his predecessor) had the courage to dissolve a female congregation which was at a certain level, because this slavery of women had entered it – slavery, even to the point of sexual slavery – on the part of clerics or the founder.”
“I think it’s still taking place because it’s not as though the moment you become aware of something it goes away,” he added.
Sexual abuse in the clergy is reported to have been an ongoing problem.
Pope Benedict in 2005 was forced to shut down an entire congregation of nuns who were being abused by priests.
Similarly, the Catholic Church’s global organisation for nuns last November denounced the “culture of silence and secrecy” that prevented them from speaking out, amid global campaigns such as #MeToo which condemned sexual abuse, publicly calling out perpetrators such as Kevin Spacey and Harvey Weinstein.
In reparation, Pope Francis simply said that the church is attempting to address the issue, failing to give any concrete measures which irked some on social media.
#PopeFrancis your holiness it's the first step in admitting what is happening but what are you going to do about it? Very often the guilty go unpunished. It's time the church acted on this and punished those responsible. Someone needs to start somewhere
— chithalka ambrose (@cambrose1211) February 7, 2019
“The Pope being the Head of the Catholic Church has the authority & responsibility to throw out any of his priests who indulge in sexual abuse of any kind. Choice is upto him,” added Ajit Sreedhar Rao on Twitter.