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	Merkel Welcomes Pope's Response to Child Sex Abuse Scandal Monsters and Critics March 15, 2010 http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1541177.php/Merkel-welcomes-pPope-s-response-to-child-sex-abuse-scandal Berlin - Germany welcomed the pope's reaction to a wide- ranging sexual abuse scandal in his home country, a spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday. 'The chancellor welcomes the fact that the Holy Father has expressly reinforced the necessity for a complete clarification of these abominable deeds,' a spokesman for Merkel said. It was also a good sign that the Catholic Church (in Germany) and its chair, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, 'have the explicit backing of the Vatican,' the spokesman added. Pope Benedict XVI has not made a public statement since Germany's top cleric briefed him on mounting revelations of sexual abuse over the past decades, during an audience at the Vatican last week. However Zollitsch relayed the pontiff's 'deep emotion and shock' at the revelations, and later told a press conference, 'We want to shed light on the truth ... even if many of the facts happened decades ago.' Merkel's spokesman said the government was, 'basically satisfied with the messages that Zollitsch brought back from the Vatican.' Meanwhile, Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger has insisted on an 'institutionalized form of clarifying the abuse,' without specifying what format that should take. Around 150 cases of sexual abuse have been reported at more than 20 German Catholic schools, some dating back to the 1950s. Of those, around 100 victims are from one school, in the southern German town of Ettal. Those reports have only been intensified by similar allegations of abuse at church facilities in Austria, Switzerland and the Netherlands. The allegations hit close to home when a German newspaper linked the pope to a paedophile priest when the pontiff was archbishop of Munich in 1980. The report in daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung said the pope, then Archbishop Joseph Ratzinger, had permitted the priest to move to Munich from another diocese where he had been accused of sexually abusing children. Earlier, it transpired that there were cases of sexual abuse in a choir directed by the pope's brother in Regensburg. On Sunday the pope, who often opts to comment on current events at the close of his weekly public prayers, chose not to remark on the scandals at church institutions in Germany and across Europe.
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