VATICAN CITY — With his moral authority in question and his papal legacy in the balance, Pope Francis opened a historic summit meeting at the Vatican on Thursday devoted to clerical child sexual abuse, an issue that has for decades devastated some corners of his vast church while being utterly ignored and denied in others. “We hear the cry of the little ones asking for justice,” Francis told the 190 leaders of the Roman Catholic Church who had assembled from around the world in the Vatican’s Synod Hall at the start of a four-day conference intended to instruct them on the depth and universality of the problem and how to deal with it. “The holy people of God look to us and expect from us not simple and obvious condemnations, but concrete and effective measures,” Francis said. Survivors of clerical abuse, their advocates and faithful disheartened and disgusted by the failure to address the abuses are demanding that the church enshrine in Canon Law a policy of zero tolerance for abusive priests and the bishops who cover for them.

Source: New York Times February 21, 2019 09:51 UTC