A Vatican commission for the protection of children has said the mishandling by the Catholic Church’s leaders of sexual abuse allegations involving clergy is causing “ongoing harm” to victims, in a hard-hitting report released Thursday.
The report also called out parts of Italy and Africa for failing to implement robust anti-abuse measures.
The Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, which released its second annual report on October 16 called for greater transparency from the Vatican and noted with “concern” that survivors often perceive the church’s central administration as “lacking in sensitivity.”
The report is the first to be released since the election of Pope Leo XIV and it sets out the scale of the challenge for the American pope in tackling the scourge of sexual abuse of children and vulnerable people inside the Catholic Church. His predecessor, Pope Francis, took some important steps to tackle the abuse crisis but experts and survivors have said he could have gone further.
“We must re-emphasise that the Church’s decades-long pattern of mishandling reports, including abandoning, ignoring, shaming, blaming, and stigmatising victims/survivors, perpetuates the trauma as an ongoing harm,” the report states.
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