BTW, the slogan for the pope's visit to Chile was 'Mi paz les doy' (My peace I give you) which is not in quotation marks and is followed by his name Papa Francisco, giving the impression that he is
imparting his peace (whatever that may be), and not that this is something Jesus said! The . Whose peace is he giving? The slogan for Peru is a generic 'Unidos por la esperanza' (United for hope) -
should that not be 'unidos en la esperanza' (United in hope')?
This is the second BBC story that has surprised me these days... Are there cracks now in what was once the MSM's monolithic and relentless hagiography of Jorge Bergoglio?
Pope's 'slander' comment
angers Chile abuse victims
19 January 2018
Pope Francis has triggered anger in Chile after accusing victims of a paedophile priest of slander.
Francis said there was "no proof" for their claims that abuse by Father Fernando Karadima had been covered up by another man, Bishop Juan Barros.
"There is not one single piece of proof against him (Bishop Barros).
It is all slander. Is that clear?" the Pope said.
One Karadima victim said the Pope's earlier plea for forgiveness over clerical sex abuse was "empty".
The Pope made his comments on Thursday before celebrating Mass outside the city of Iquique in northern Chile.
"The day someone brings me proof against Bishop Barros, then I will talk," the Pope told journalists.
What is the controversy about?
The Catholic Church suffered a body blow in Chile in 2010 when Father Karadima was publicly accused of molesting several teenaged boys in the capital, Santiago, starting in the 1980s. In 2011, under Benedict XVI, the Vatican found him guilty of abusing teenage boys and sentenced to a lifetime of "penance and prayer".
He never faced criminal prosecution in Chile as too much time had passed, but the judge who heard victims' testimony in a year-long investigation described them as "truthful and reliable".
Mr Cruz says that Bishop Barros was present when Father Karadima - then the bishop's mentor - kissed and groped him and another boy. While Bishop Barros has not been accused of abuse, the Pope has been criticised for appointing him bishop of Osorno in 2015. Barros's ordination ceremony had to be cut short over protests in the cathedral.
What is the response from accusers?
Juan Carlos Cruz was one of the bishop's accusers who was quick to condemn the Pope's stance.
"As if I could have taken a selfie or photo while Karadima abused me and others with Juan Barros standing next to him watching everything," he tweeted.
"These people are absolutely crazy, and @Pontifex (the Pope's Twitter handle) is talking about reparation to the victims. Nothing has changed, and his plea for forgiveness is empty."
Another Barros accuser, James Hamilton, told a news conference the response revealed an "unknown face" of the pontiff.
"What the Pope has done today is offensive and painful, and not only against us, but against everyone seeking to end the abuses" he said.
Pope's defence will raise questions
Analysis
by James Reynolds in Rome
Pope Francis began his trip to Chile with an uncompromising message: "It is right to ask for forgiveness and to make every effort to support the victims [of abuse committed by priests]."
This makes his subsequent dismissal of claims made again
st Bishop Juan Barros all the more difficult for victims to understand.
At the heart of this issue lies the Pope's decision to offer his consistent support to the bishop. In 2015, despite opposition in Chile, Francis appointed Juan Barros as the Bishop of Osorno. The Pope was then recorded telling visitors to the Vatican that there was not a shred of evidence that the bishop had covered up crimes committed by a fellow priest. On his trip to Chile, Francis repeated this blunt defence of Juan Barros.
In legal terms, the burden of proof does not lie with the Pope or his bishop to prove the bishop's innocence. But a papacy is also judged in other ways. Some will wonder why the Pope does not offer a more detailed explanation as to exactly why he chooses to believe and defend a bishop against the cover-up allegations made by victims in Chile.
The controversy comes at a time when questions are being asked about the Vatican's efforts to tackle clerical sexual abuse. In 2014, the Pope set up a high-profile commission to advise him. But the two commission members who were themselves survivors of clerical abuse resigned in protest at an apparent lack of progress.
At the end of 2017, the commission's term formally expired. Its exact future is unclear. [That the pope has not even bothered to extend its term is indicative in itself of a fundamental lack of seriousness in Bergoglio's periodic iterations of 'zero tolerance' for priestly sex offenders even as he appears to be coddling not a few those who have serious charges of involvement and actual commission of abuses!]
What other response has there been in Chile?
Another senior Catholic figure in Chile, Bishop Alejandro Goic of Rancagua, criticised Bishop Barros's continuing role in the Church, telling T13 radio: "It left me with a bitter taste that a brother of mine occupied a leading role [in the abuse scandal] - that was not good."
He added: "The victims are the priority, they should be the main concern of the Church."
The state co-ordinator for the Pope's visit to Chile, Benito Baranda, told Radio Cooperativa that
Bishop Barros "should have stopped being a bishop a long time ago" and that his presence was damaging the Church.
Writing in
La Tercera newspaper, journalist Ascanio Cavallo said the Pope's stance could "multiply the wrath" of those who want to see the bishop expelled from his post, but added: "There is no longer any doubt: the Pope supports his bishop."
Earlier in his Chile trip, Francis had met victims of sexual abuse by priests in the country. He cried with them and said he felt "pain and shame" over the scandal.
[To which he appears to have a selective bias. Would it not have been more dramatic - and genuinely pastoral - if he had asked to meet with Barros's accusers and listen to their stories, instead of simply dismissing what they say as 'slander'?]
The US-based NGO Bishop Accountability says almost 80 members of Catholic clergy have been accused of child sex abuse in Chile since 2000.
Pope Francis arrived in Peru late on Thursday for a three-day visit which will conclude his two-nation South America trip.
Pope defends accused bishop,
denounces accusers:
The pattern is familiar
By Phil Lawler
catholicculture.org
January 19, 2018
In the bad old days, when Catholic parents reported that a priest had abused their child, and/or that the pastor was aware of the abuse, the bishop might scold them, saying that their complaints were nonsense, saying that they had no proof, accusing them of calumny.
The bishop might make these harsh statements, in the bad old days, even if he was fully aware of charges against the priest — even if he had encouraged the pastor to resign because of his mishandling of the situation.
These were the bad old days.
But in the bad old days the faithful parents still had some reasons to hope for justice:
- They could hope that a petition to Rome would reach the ears of the Pope. But now it’s the Pope who is denouncing the accusers.
- They could hope that the secular courts would provide satisfaction. But the secular courts in Chile have already rendered their verdict —acknowledging the strength of the accusations — and the Pope is not swayed.
- They could hope that mass-media outlets would investigate their claims, putting more pressure on the bishop to take them seriously. But now the mass media still give Pope Francis the friendliest of coverage.
[Not in Chile at the moment! And not lately by the BBC!]
In the bad old days, a bishop could dismiss and insult aggrieved parents just because he could: because no one held him accountable.
These are the bad old days again.
It was not accidental that to represent him at the centenary celebration of the Church in Scranton, Pennsylvania, this pope chose disgraced Cardinal Roger Mahony, former Archbishop of San Francisco whose record in pro-active covering-up for the sex-offender priests in his archdiocese was arguably far worse than the late Cardinal Law! Of all the cardinals Bergoglio could have named, why choose Mahony at all? I think it was Lawler himself who commented that this was a deliberate slap at Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia, who was probably the first bishop in the world to have issued pastoral guidelines on AL that upheld Catholic teaching and tradition rather than the open sacramental indiscipline and sacrilege of AL.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 20/01/2018 03:43]