The Vatican on Wednesday came to the defense of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, implicated in his handling of sexual violence against minors by a report published last week in Germany.
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According to this independent report, Benedict XVI, who resigned in 2013, did nothing to remove four clergymen suspected of sexual abuse of minors in the archdiocese of Munich and Freising, which he led between 1977 and 1982.
But the Vatican, through the voice of the Holy See’s media editorial director, defended the action of the German prelate against sexual abuse in the Catholic Church during his papal mandate.
After having “combatted this phenomenon as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”, Joseph Ratzinger promulgated as pope “extremely severe regulations against clerics who abuse, real special laws to combat pedophilia writes Andrea Tornielli in an editorial published Wednesday on Vatican News, the official Vatican website.
“It was Joseph Ratzinger himself who was the first pope to meet the victims of abuse several times during his apostolic journeys. Just as it was Benedict XVI (…) who proposed the face of a penitent Church, which humbles itself by asking for forgiveness”, he continues.
Recalling that the Munich report is “not a judicial inquiry and even less a final judgment”, Mr. Tornielli believes that its conclusions “will contribute to the fight against pedophilia in the Church if they are not reduced to research easy scapegoats and summary judgments.
On Monday, Benedict XVI corrected his statements and admitted having participated in a key meeting in 1980 on a German priest suspected of having sexually assaulted minors, contrary to what he had declared to the authors of the report. But he denies any responsibility in this case.
After the publication of the report, the Holy See said it wanted to study it in detail, reiterating “its feeling of shame and remorse” for the violence committed.