Pope ends Latin American trip with warning about political corruption
LIMA, (Reuters) - Pope Francis celebrated an open air Mass for more than 1 million people yesterday, ending a trip to Chile and Peru marked by tough talk on political corruption but a backlash over what many see as his insufficient resolve to tackle sexual abuse in the Church.
In the final hours of his six-day visit to the two nations, Francis warned in improvised remarks that Latin America was in a deep crisis from corruption scandals, with politics in most countries “more sick than well.”
“Politics is in crisis, very much in crisis in Latin America,” he said, pointing to construction company Odebrecht, which has admitted to paying billions in bribes, as an example of greed run amok across the continent of his birth.
The Catholic Church’s record on sexual abuse loomed large in both countries, but mostly in Chile, where Francis sparked outrage by saying criticism of a bishop he appointed who is accused of protecting a pedophile was “all slander.”
Francis told reporters in Chile there was no evidence against the bishop, spurring Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston to sympathize with victims who were pained by the pope’s comments in an unusually blunt statement.
O’Malley, a top adviser, was celebrating Mass with Francis at Las Palmas Air Base under a biting sun just before the pope was due to leave for Rome.
Despite the estimated 1.3 million attendance in Lima, the Church is losing followers in Latin America. Even before the pope’s off-the-cuff remarks in Chile, a poll by Santiago-based think tank Latinobarometer showed the number of Chileans calling themselves Catholic had plummeted to 45 percent from 74 percent in 1995.
The number of Catholics in Peru, where Francis consistently had a more enthusiastic reception, remains high at around 72 percent, according to a Datum poll, though it has fallen in the past decade.
“Francis here there is proof!” read a banner hanging from a Lima apartment with a picture of Luis Figari, the founder of an elite Catholic society who is scheduled to go on trial in Peru this year for sexual abuse of minors. Figari has denied wrongdoing.