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POPE FRANCIS HAS admitted that Catholic priests and bishops had sexually abused nuns.
“There are some priests and also bishops who have done it,” the pontiff said in response to a journalist’s question on the abuse of nuns. He was speaking yesterday on the return flight from his trip to the United Arab Emirates.
His admission followed a rare outcry last week from the Vatican’s women’s magazine over the sexual abuse of nuns, leaving them feeling forced to have abortions or raise children not recognised by their priest fathers.
The issue hit the headlines last year after a nun accused an Indian bishop of repeatedly raping her in a case that triggered rare dissent within the country’s Catholic Church.
The February issue of Women Church World, a supplement distributed with the Vatican’s Osservatore Romano newspaper, warned that nuns have been silent over abuse for decades for fear of retaliation.
It said the Vatican received reports of priests abusing nuns in Africa in the 1990s.
“If the Church continues to close its eyes to the scandal — made even worse by the fact that abuse of women brings about procreation and is therefore at the origin of forced abortions and children who aren’t recognised by priests — the oppression of women in the Church will never change,” editor Lucetta Scaraffia wrote.
Francis said the problem could be found “anywhere” but was prevalent in “some new congregations and in some regions”. He added:
I think it’s still going on, because it’s not something that just goes away like that. On the contrary.
He said the Church has “suspended several clerics” and the Vatican has been “working (on the issue) for a long time”.
‘Must do more’
“I don’t want to hear it said that the Church has not got this problem, because it has.
“Must we do more? Yes! Do we want to? Yes!” he said.
He said it was a cultural problem, the roots of which lie in “seeing women as second class”.
In the Indian case, Bishop Franco Mulakkal was arrested on September 21 in the southern state of Kerala on suspicion of raping the nun in question 13 times between 2014 and 2016.
Pope Francis suspended him the day before his arrest, appointing another bishop in his place. Mulakkal, 53, who headed the diocese of Jalandhar in the northern state of Punjab, has denied the allegations.
The nun first spoke out in June but police only started formal questioning in September, as fury over the case mounted.
Five nuns — in a rare public show of dissent within the Indian Church — and dozens of supporters staged days of protests.
Failure by Church officials to take action on sexual abuse allegations has been one of the biggest scandals to hit Roman Catholicism globally in recent years.
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I’d love to get his autograph on a letter of resignation.
@Cillian McCormick: Wouldn’t that be something especially accompanied by other resignation letters
There’s still time for a Christmas miracle.
Wonker
Let’s call a spade a spade, an awful lot more don’t like him.
Hardly surprising on the face of it as Fine Gael are a pro life party and Enda himself has stated his position on the matter clearly:
‘This is a Catholic country – there will be no abortion in this republic as long as I’m in office’.
@Alex Falcone: thankfully he will not always be in office.. As a matter of fact I would say his time in office is coming to an end sooner rather than later. Happy Xmas Alex, cal, noah, Isaac, eunuch Burke.
@Alex Falcone: can you direct me to where you found that “quote”? The only one I can find is this one, which pretty much contradicts yours completely…. “I am a Taoiseach who happens to be Catholic but not a Catholic Taoiseach” enda Kenny , when passing abortion legislation despite backlash from your Bishops.
@Dell: Seems like Alex has run away into his safe place.You will find that precious snowflakes like him will do that when they are found out with their BS.
@Alex Falcone: “‘This is a Catholic country – there will be no abortion in this republic as long as I’m in office’.”
A Catholic country that has gay marriage? Yeah you keep fooling yourself into thinking that :-)
@Clon Lad:
‘Precious snowflake’
Have you just suggested I’m a liberal?
Right, I’m contacting my solicitor immediately.
@Alex Falcone: you couldn’t reach the level of liberal on your mammy’s Shoulders . Ya know, the one you pretended to not be related to on the radio when you were both complaining about same sex marriage. So Alex _eunuch.. Show us where that “quote”‘ came from… . Or were you lying? That’s a sin you know ? A Big no no with the great big deity in the sky you believe in.
@Dell:
Have you missed an appointment with your psychiatrist lately?
Why redact the names and addresses of the senders? Why make the emails and letters anonymous?
@Micheal OLainn: why do you want to harass them?
@Micheal OLainn: Very simply Michael – the mails were a private communication between the sender and the recipient. This should always be respected no matter who the senders or recipients are.
No need to redact all the email addresses… some of them were clearly from mammykenny@gmail.com
Those autographs are probably for African gang members for forgeries. Kenny probably falls for it every time. Then some money goes missing from the state coffers, and its raise taxes again and hide the losses in the water debt fiasco.
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