Vatican City — Pope Francis on Monday used his first meeting with victims of clerical sex abuse to offer his strongest condemnation of a crisis that has shaken the Roman Catholic Church, comparing priests who abuse minors to “a sacrilegious cult,” while begging forgiveness from victims and pledging to crack down on bishops who fail to protect children.
By meeting with six victims from three countries, Francis was trying to demonstrate resolve — and personal empathy — to address an issue on which he has faced criticism in what has otherwise been a wildly popular papacy. While some advocates for victims praised the meeting, others dismissed it as little more than a publicity stunt.
Francis first greeted the six victims — two people each from Ireland, Britain and Germany — on Sunday after they had arrived at a Vatican guesthouse. On Monday morning, he led them in a private Mass at a Vatican chapel, where he offered a strongly worded homily condemning an abuse scandal that began to surface decades ago under John Paul II. Francis also met with each victim individually in sessions that, in total, lasted more than three hours.
“Before God and his people, I express my sorrow for the sins and grave crimes of clerical sexual abuse committed against you,” Francis said during his homily, according to a text released by the Vatican. “And I humbly ask forgiveness. I beg your forgiveness, too, for the sins of omission on the part of church leaders who did not respond adequately to reports of abuse made by family members, as well as by abuse victims themselves.”
In his homily, Francis also vowed “not to tolerate harm done to a minor by any individual, whether a cleric or not,” and declared that bishops would be held accountable for protecting minors. He said the abuse scandals had had “a toxic effect on faith and hope in God.”
Francis has won widespread praise for his humble personal style and his efforts to overhaul the Vatican bureaucracy, but his handling of the sexual abuse issue has prompted some sharp criticism. His failure to meet personally with victims during the first 15 months of his papacy — John Paul II and Benedict XVI, Francis’ immediate predecessor, made the gesture several times — was seen as insensitive by critics, especially given the empathetic nature of his papacy.
At least one of the victims who met with Francis left impressed. Marie Kane, 43, who endured abuse by a priest in Dublin, described the meeting as “pretty amazing,” and told The Irish Independent that the pope “listened intently” as she spoke to him while Cardinal Sean Patrick O’Malley of Boston acted as an interpreter.
“There was no pomp or ceremony, and plus he is not really tall, so he is not towering over you, which is really nice,” Ms. Kane told The Independent. “He holds eye contact very well.”
She said she told Francis that the church needed greater accountability, and that she would not feel as though progress had been made until bishops who covered up the abuse had been removed.
Other victims advocacy groups echoed that sentiment, arguing that the Vatican still has done too little to create a strong, accountable system to prevent abuse and to stop bishops from protecting abusive priests by reassigning them to other dioceses or by neglecting to report accusations to the civil authorities.
“These meetings are public relations coups for the Vatican and distracting placebos for others,” Mary Caplan, a member of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, an advocacy group, said in a statement. “They provide temporary but false hope.”
Another victims advocacy group, BishopAccountability.org, praised the meeting as “a positive and necessary step,” and described Francis’ vow to discipline bishops who fail to adequately protect minors as “a significant and historic promise.”
But in a statement, a co-director of the group, Anne Barrett Doyle, called on Francis to also meet with victims from his native Argentina — with whom he never met during his tenure as archbishop of Buenos Aires — and to revise canon law to require bishops to report suspicions of sexual abuse to the civil authorities.
In recent months, the Vatican has faced criticism over its handling of clerical sex abuse from two United Nations committees. Most recently, in May, the United Nations Committee Against Torture called on Vatican officials to take more effective steps to prevent abuse, amid reports that church officials in some dioceses still refused to report cases to the local police.
But Vatican officials say many of the concerns raised by the United Nations committees were outdated, and they point to several changes made under Francis. He has appointed a special commission to address the abuse issue, and included a prominent Irish abuse-victim-turned-advocate among the members.
Last month, the Vatican defrocked its former ambassador to the Dominican Republic after he was accused of abusing boys. The former archbishop, Jozef Wesolowski, 65, has two months to appeal the decision.
Francis made public his decision to meet with abuse victims while returning from his May trip to the Holy Land. At the time, he referred to the abuse of minors as “very ugly” and a “serious” crime that he compared to sacrilege.
Francis’ strong words in May came after he drew criticism two months earlier by arguing that the Roman Catholic Church had confronted the crisis with greater “transparency and responsibility” than other public institutions, yet had borne the brunt of attacks from advocates.
Some victims advocates dismissed the remarks as insensitive and “triumphalist.”
On Sunday, Francis’ special commission to address the crisis held its second meeting, mostly to discuss the appointment of new members, possibly from Africa, Asia and elsewhere. In his Monday homily, Francis called on his commission “to develop better policies and procedures” to protect minors and to train church personnel. “We need to do everything in our power to ensure that these sins have no place in the church,” he said.
At a news conference on Monday, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, dismissed the idea that the meeting was about public relations and described the meetings between the victims and the pope as “very intense.”
“This is an important step on a path of healing and reconciliation,” said Father Lombardi, who declined to release the names of the six victims.