Pope admits church realized sex abuse problem ‘a bit late’

VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis on Thursday acknowledged the Catholic Church was “a bit late” in realizing the damage done by priests who rape and molest children, and said that the decades-long practice of moving pedophiles around rather than sanctioning them was to blame.

Francis met Thursday for the first time with his sex abuse advisory commission of outside experts named in 2014 to advise the Catholic Church on best practices to keep pedophiles out of the priesthood and to protect children.

Commission members briefed him on their work and made a series of proposals that, if accepted, would mark a major turnabout in the way the church handles abuse cases.

One recommendation is for sex abuse cases to be exempted from church’s norms requiring “pontifical secret.” Commissioners proposed that victims be guaranteed a “minimum right to information” as their claims are processed in the normally secrecyfilled church process. They also proposed ending the 20-year statute of limitations on abuse accusations.

In addition, the commission said it was discussing the problem of when church law “impedes the reporting of suspected child abuse to civil authorities.”

The Vatican has long insisted that the inviolability of the seal of confession prevents clergy who might learn about abuse through the sacramental practice as an impediment to reporting crimes to law enforcement. Recently, however, Australia’s royal commission has called for clergy to face criminal charges if they learn of abuse in confession and fail to report it.

Francis thanked the members and acknowledged they had had a difficult job going “against the current” in making the Vatican aware of the problem and respond to it.