Pope calls for better pornography web filters

VATICAN CITY— Pope Francis on Friday denounced the proliferation of adult and child pornography on the internet and demanded better protections for children online — even as the Vatican confronts its own crossborder child porn investigation involving a top papal envoy.

Francis met with participants of a Catholic Church-backed conference on fighting child pornography. He fully backed their proposals to toughen sanctions against those who abuse and exploit children online and improve filters to prevent young people from accessing porn.

Francis said the Catholic Church knew well the “grave error” of trying to conceal the problem of sexual abuse — a reference to the church’s long history of having priests who rape and molest children and bishops who cover up for them.

Using terms that are certainly new to papal lexicon, Francis denounced “extreme pornography” on the web that adults, and increasingly children, consume, and the increasing use of “sexting” and “sextortion” among minors who navigate the internet.

“We would be seriously deluding ourselves were we to think that a society where an abnormal consumption of internet sex is rampant among adults could be capable of effectively protecting minors,” he said.

Windsor, Ont., police have issued an arrest warrant for Monsignor Carlo Capella, accusing him of accessing, possessing and distributing child pornography during a visit to a Windsor church. He is now in the Vatican, where prosecutors have opened an investigation.

Some U.S. church officials and critics said the Vatican should have waived diplomatic immunity and let Capella face charges in the U.S. or Canada.