Pope acknowledges pain of abuse among victims, priests
SANTIAGO, Chile — Pope Francis met Tuesday with survivors of priests who sexually abused them, wept with them and apologized for the “irreparable damage” they suffered, his spokesman said.
The pontiff also acknowledged the “pain” of priests who have been held collectively responsible for the crimes of a few, a Vatican spokesman said.
Francis dove head-first into Chile’s sex abuse scandal on his first full day in Santiago that came amid unprecedented opposition to his visit: Three more churches were torched overnight, including one burned to the ground in the southern Araucania region where Francis celebrates Mass on Wednesday. Police used tear gas and water cannons to break up an anti-pope protest outside Francis’ big open-air Mass in the capital, Santiago.
Despite the incidents, huge numbers of Chileans turned out to see the pope, including an estimated 400,000 for his Mass, and he brought some inmates to tears with an emotional visit to a women’s prison.
But his meeting with abuse survivors and comments in his first speech of the day what many Chileans, incensed by years of abuse scandal and coverup, were waiting for.
A spokesman said Francis met with a small group of abuse victims, listening to their stories and praying with them.
Earlier in the day, Francis told Chilean President Michelle Bachelet and other authorities that he felt “bound to express my pain and shame” that some of Chile’s clergy had sexually abused children.
Later, Francis told hundreds of priests gathered in Santiago’s cathederal that the scandal had not only caused pain in the victims, but in the broader church community and among anyone who wears a clerical collar.