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Pope Francis expresses his 'shame' at scale of French Catholic Church child abuse and 'sadness' over suffering of 330,000 victims after report found nuns used crucifixes to rape girls

 Pope Francis   today expressed his personal shame at the scale of child abuse carried out by clergy in   France 's Catholic Church that...

 Pope Francis today expressed his personal shame at the scale of child abuse carried out by clergy in France's Catholic Church that saw attacks on 330,000 children. 

The pontiff told of his 'sadness' for the victims after a damning report found nuns used crucifixes to rape girls during decades of abuse which was covered up by a 'veil of silence'.

The 2,500-page landmark report was released Tuesday after more than two years of investigations by an independent commission, in France's first major reckoning with the devastating phenomenon.

The commission found that an estimated 330,000 children were victims of sex abuse within France's Catholic Church between 1950 to 2020, with an estimated 216,000 minors abused by priests and other clerics.

'There is, unfortunately, a considerable number I wish to express to the victims my sadness and pain for the trauma they have suffered,' Francis said during his weekly audience at the Vatican on Wednesday. 

Pope Francis today expressed his personal shame at the scale of child abuse carried out by clergy in France's Catholic Church that saw attacks on 330,000 children

Pope Francis today expressed his personal shame at the scale of child abuse carried out by clergy in France's Catholic Church that saw attacks on 330,000 children


The pontiff told of his 'sadness' for the victims after a damning report found nuns used crucifixes to rape girls during decades of abuse which was covered up by a 'veil of silence'

The pontiff told of his 'sadness' for the victims after a damning report found nuns used crucifixes to rape girls during decades of abuse which was covered up by a 'veil of silence' 


'And also my shame, our shame, my shame, for the inability of the Church for too long to put them at the centre of its concerns. 

'I pray and we all pray together - to you Lord the glory, to us the shame. This is the time for shame.' 

He called on all bishops and religious superiors to take all actions necessary 'so similar dramas are not repeated.'  

The findings of the inquiry have prompted outrage as the Catholic Church in France and around the world faces a growing number of abuse claims and prosecutions.

Dealing with the avalanche of revelations about sexual abuse by clergy was one of the biggest challenges that Francis faced when he was elected pope in 2013.

He declared an end to impunity and changed Vatican law to make reporting abuse mandatory, but victims have warned it is not enough.

Francis expressed his sorrow for the victims in a statement Tuesday issued through his spokesman, but his comments on Wednesday went further.

He urged the clergy to keep working to ensure such situations 'are not repeated', offering his support to French priests to face up to 'this trial that is hard but healthy'.

And he invited French Catholics to 'assume their responsibilities to ensure that the Church is a safe home for all'. 

The report found that the 'vast majority' of victims were pre-adolescent boys from a variety of social backgrounds. Their abusers were mainly priests, bishops, deacons and monks.

When claims against lay members of the Church, such as teachers at Catholic schools, are included the number of child abuse victims climbs to 330,000 since 1950, the report found.

Eighty per cent of victims were young boys between the ages of 10 and 13, however many girls also suffered abuse, not only by priests but also by nuns.

Nuns used crucifixes to rape little girls or forced boys to have sex with them, reports the Daily Beast.  

A victim named 'Marie' testified that she was abused as an 11-year-old and that when she complained about the abuse to her parents they refused to believe a nun could do such a thing. The abuse continued for another year.

She recalls a nun who would choose a student from her class every day to help her with Mass. 

'I was 11 and looked 9. She would choose me once every two or three times,' 'Marie' recalls. 

'She would take me to her office, lock the door, and then draw the curtains. After which she would put me on her knees to make me read the gospel according to Saint Paul or another saint, while she squeezed me with one hand to her chest and pulled down my panties with the other hand. 

'We were of course in pleated skirts and not in pants. It terrified me and paralyzed.'

'I was truly [a gift] for this nun... because she knew full well that she did not risk anything,' Marie said. 

'Until the early 2000s, the Catholic Church showed a profound and even cruel indifference towards the victims,' commission chief Jean-Marc Sauve told a press conference that unveiled the nearly 2,500-page report.  

They were 'not believed or not heard' and sometimes suspected of being 'in part responsible' for what happened, he deplored.

Sauve underlined that Catholic authorities had covered up the abuse spanning 70 years in a 'systematic manner'. 

Victims welcomed the 2,500-page document as long overdue, and the head of the French Catholic bishops' conference asked for their forgiveness. 


At least 330,000 children were sexually abused in France's Catholic Church over the last 70 years, a damning report has found. Pictured: The head of France's Catholic bishops conference, Eric de Moulins-Beaufort

At least 330,000 children were sexually abused in France's Catholic Church over the last 70 years, a damning report has found. Pictured: The head of France's Catholic bishops conference, Eric de Moulins-Beaufort

Archbishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort, president of the Bishops' Conference of France (CEF), which co-requested the report, expressed his 'shame and horror' at the findings.

'My wish today is to ask forgiveness from each of you,' he told the news conference.   

'No one expected such a high number (of victims) to come out of the survey and that is properly frightening and out of proportion with the perception that we've had on the ground,' he told the AP. 

Francois Devaux, head of the victims' group La Parole Liberee (The Liberated Word), said the report was 'a turning point in our history.' He denounced the coverups that permitted 'mass crimes for decades.'

'But even worse, there was a betrayal: betrayal of trust, betrayal of morality, betrayal of children, betrayal of innocence,' he added.

French actor Laurent Martinez was raped by a priest when he was eight-years-old. 

Martinez, 51, told Sky News the priest was moved to another location after he told his parents of the abuse, but it still haunted him. 

He said: 'It's been haunting me all these years.  I'm really not completely freed about it.'  

Martinez said the abuse has impacted his relationships with women and meant he is apprehensive about sexual relationships, which he feels is 'something forbidden'. He has since written a play about the abuse called Pardon? to help him deal with the abuse.

French actor Laurent Martinez: 'It's been haunting me all these years'
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The 2,500-page landmark report was released Tuesday after more than two years of investigations by an independent commission. Pictured: Commission president Jean-Marc Sauve (left), hands copies of the report to Catholic Bishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort (right)

The 2,500-page landmark report was released Tuesday after more than two years of investigations by an independent commission. Pictured: Commission president Jean-Marc Sauve (left), hands copies of the report to Catholic Bishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort (right)

Martine, 73, and Mireille, 71, were sexually assaulted by a priest when they were teenage girls in high school. They both declined to give their last name due to privacy reasons, in part because some family members were not aware of the abuses.

'It brings on such terrible thoughts,' Martine said. 'For me, personally, I had to wait for my parents to die' because otherwise she said it was 'not possible' to speak out.

'I think that each victim experienced it as if they were the only one (victim), and that's part of this phenomenon involving control and secrecy,' Mireille said. 'We are in a condition of submission... in a mental captivity. So, we follow this person who suddenly takes power over us... We are caught in a spider web.'

A recognition of the fault is essential, she said, and financial compensation is 'really symbolic... it won't fix things but it means it will also cost them something.'

Olivier Savignac, who was sexually abused by a priest in 1993, at the age of 13, has contributed to the report as a victims' representative. 

Savignac, the head of victims association Parler et Revivre (Speak Out and Live Again), said the high ratio of victims per abuser was particularly 'terrifying for French society, for the Catholic Church.'

Savignac assailed the church for treating such cases as individual anomalies instead of as a collective horror. 

He described being abused at age 13 by the director of a Catholic vacation camp in the south of France who was accused of assaulting several other boys. 

'I perceived this priest as someone who was good, a caring person who would not harm me,' said Savignac. 'But it was when I found myself on that bed half-naked and he was touching me that I realised something was wrong...'

He says the abuse, which carried on for years, damaged him for life: 'It's like a growing cyst, it's like gangrene inside the victim's body and the victim's psyche.' 

It is estimated that about 3,000 perpetrators have committed acts over the past 70 years and about 80 per cent of victims are male. Pictured: Olivier Savignac, head of victims association 'Parler et Revivre' (Speak out and Live again) speaks during an interview on Monday

It is estimated that about 3,000 perpetrators have committed acts over the past 70 years and about 80 per cent of victims are male. Pictured: Olivier Savignac, head of victims association 'Parler et Revivre' (Speak out and Live again) speaks during an interview on Monday

'We can see how systemic it was... with an estimated number of 216,000 victims,' Savignac told Reuters, adding that the Church could not have ignored something of that magnitude.

'It's an earthquake, a hurricane, a tsunami... when you see these numbers, it's so damning that no one can stay in denial, whether the Catholic Church or society as a whole,' he added.    

The priest eventually was found guilty of child sexual abuse and sentenced in 2018 to three years in prison, including one year suspended.

The independent commission, made up of 22 lawyers, doctors, historians, sociologists and theologians, worked for two-and-a-half years, listening to victims and witnesses and studying church, court, police and press archives starting from the 1950s.

A hotline launched at the beginning of the probe received 6,500 calls from alleged victims or people who said they knew a victim.

'The consequences are very serious,' Sauvé said. 'About 60 per cent of men and women who were sexually abused encounter major problems in their sentimental or sexual life.'

'Sometimes church officials did not denounce (the sex abuses) and even exposed children to risks by putting them in contact with predators,' Sauve said. 

Sauve had already said on Sunday that a 'minimum estimate' of 2,900 to 3,200 clergy members had sexually abused children in the French Church since 1950.

Yet only a handful of cases prompted disciplinary action under canonical law, let alone criminal prosecution.

Sauvé said 22 alleged crimes that can still be pursued have been forwarded to prosecutors. More than 40 cases that are too old to be prosecuted but involve alleged perpetrators who are still alive have been forwarded to church officials. 

The commission urged the church to take strong action, denouncing its 'faults' and 'silence.' 

It issued 45 recommendations about how to prevent abuse. These included training priests and other clerics, revising Canon Law - the legal code the Vatican uses to govern the church - and fostering policies to recognize and compensate victims, Sauvé said.

It also called on the Catholic Church to help compensate the victims, particularly in cases that are too old to prosecute in French courts. 

'We consider the church has a debt towards victims,' Sauve said.   

Luc Crepy, the bishop of Versailles who heads an office fighting pedophilia, said 'this is more than a shock. It is a deep feeling of shame.'

Crepy said a process was underway to put together funds and create an independent commission to handle church compensation for the victims.

The report comes after a scandal surrounding now-defrocked priest Bernard Preynat rocked the French Catholic Church. Last year, Preynat was convicted of sexually abusing minors and given a five-year prison sentence. He admitted abusing more than 75 boys for decades.

One of Preynat's victims, Francois Devaux, head of the victims group La Parole Libérée ('The Liberated Word'), told The Associated Press that 'with this report, the French church for the first time is going to the root of this systemic problem. The deviant institution must reform itself.'

He said the number of victims the report identifies is 'a minimum.'

The commission that compiled the report urged compensation for victims and strong action from the church, saying the abuse was covered up for decades by a 'veil of silence.' Pictured: Francois Devaux, founder of victim association 'La parole liberee'

The commission that compiled the report urged compensation for victims and strong action from the church, saying the abuse was covered up for decades by a 'veil of silence.' Pictured: Francois Devaux, founder of victim association 'La parole liberee'

'Some victims did not dare to speak out or trust the commission,' he said, expressing concerns that the church in France still 'hasn´t understood' and has sought to minimize its responsibilities.

The church must not only acknowledge events but also compensate victims, Devaux said. 'It is indispensable that the church redresses the harm caused by all these crimes, and (financial) compensation is the first step.'

The Preynat case led to the resignation last year of the former archbishop of Lyon, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, who has been accused of failing to report the abuses to civil authorities when he learned about them in the 2010s. France´s highest court ruled earlier this year that Barbarin did not cover up the case.

French archbishops, in a message to parishioners read during Sunday Mass across the country, said the publication of the report is 'a test of truth and a tough and serious moment.'

'We will receive and study these conclusions to adapt our actions,' the message said. 'The fight against pedophilia concerns all of us ... Our support and our prayers will keep going toward all the people who have been abused within the church.'

Pope Francis issued in May 2019 a groundbreaking new church law requiring all Catholic priests and nuns around the world to report clergy sexual abuse and cover-ups by their superiors to church authorities.

In June, Francis swiftly rejected an offer from Cardinal Reinhard Marx, one of Germany's most prominent clerics and a close papal adviser, to resign as archbishop of Munich and Freising over the church´s mishandling of abuse cases. 

But he said a process of reform was necessary and every bishop must take responsibility for the 'catastrophe' of the crisis.

Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said Pope Francis learned about the report's findings 'with sorrow.'

'His thoughts go in first place to the victims, with a profound sadness for their wounds and gratitude for their courage to speak out,' he said.

Francis issued in May 2019 a groundbreaking new church law requiring all Catholic priests and nuns to report clergy sexual abuse and cover-ups by their superiors to church authorities. In June, Francis said a process of reform was necessary and every bishop must take responsibility for the 'catastrophe' of the sex abuse crisis.

The shocking estimate of more than a quarter million potential victims dwarfs numbers released by other countries that have also faced national reckoning with church sexual abuse. But each country has investigated the problem in different ways.

Instead of limiting itself to specific cases, France's report made an estimate of the overall scale of the problem, extrapolating the number of victims based on study of specific incidents and nationwide surveys.

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