Bishops taken to task at Vatican

Women admonish leaders over sex abuse

VATICAN CITY— A prominent Nigerian nun blasted the culture of silence that has long kept clergy sexual abuse hidden in the Catholic Church, telling Catholic leaders Saturday that they must transparently admit their mistakes to restore trust among the faithful.

A Mexican journalist followed up, telling the bishops and others at Pope Francis’ abuse summit that their collective failure to report abuse and inform their flocks about predator priests made them complicit in the crimes.

In between those admonitions, a German cardinal admitted that church files about abusers had been destroyed, victims were silenced and church procedures were ignored — all in an attempt to keep the scandal under wraps.

Sister Veronica Openibo, Mexican correspondent Valentina Alazraki and German Cardinal Reinhard Marx delivered powerful speeches to nearly 190 church leaders on the third day of Pope Francis’ four-day tutorial on preventing abuse and protecting children.

The first two days focused on the responsibility of church leaders in tending to their flocks and how they must be held accountable when they fail to properly protect young people from predator priests. Saturday was dedicated to issues of transparency and breaking the code of silence. And it was dominated by women. Openibo was one of only a handful of women invited to the meeting, and she used her time at the podium to shame the church leadership for their silence in the face of such crimes. “How could the clerical church have kept silent, covering these atrocities?” she asked.

“We must acknowledge that our mediocrity, hypocrisy and complacency have brought us to this disgraceful and scandalous place we find ourselves as a church.”