Church Must Recognize " Terrifying" Truth of Abuse: Pope, by Philip Pullella, Reuters, May 11, 2010

Church Must Recognize " Terrifying" Truth of Abuse: Pope

By Philip Pullella
Reuters
May 11, 2010

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64A1W220100511

Pope Benedict said on Tuesday the crisis of sexual abuse of children by priests should make the Catholic leaders acknowledge the "terrifying" truth that the greatest threat comes from "sin within the Church."

In some of his most comprehensive public comments since the sexual abuse scandal broke two months ago, Benedict said the Church has "a very deep need" to acknowledge that it must do penitence for its sins and "accept purification."

"Today we see in a truly terrifying way that the greatest persecution of the Church does not come from outside enemies but is born of sin within the Church," he told reporters on the plane taking him to Portugal, in response to a question about the scandal.

In recent weeks, a number of Vatican officials have accused the media of waging a smear campaign against the Church, with one top Vatican official going as far as dismissing reports of a cover up of sexual abuse as "petty gossip."

The 83-year-old German pontiff, facing the worst crisis of his five-year-old papacy, said the Church had to seek forgiveness from victims of sexual abuse but also recognized that "forgiveness cannot be a substitute for justice."

"SUFFERING OF THE CHURCH"

The Pope accepted on Saturday the resignation of Bishop Walter Mixa of Augsburg following accusations that he sexually abused minors. It was the first bishop to quit in the Pope's native Germany, and came just over two weeks after a Belgian bishop stepped down after admitting he had sexually abused a boy.

Irish Bishop James Moriarty also tendered his resignation in late April, saying he failed to tackle abuse while he was auxiliary bishop of Dublin from 1991 to 2001 -- the third bishop to resign since the scandal in Ireland hit the headlines.

The main purpose of the pope's four-day visit to Portugal is to visit the shrine at Fatima where the Madonna is said to have appeared to three shepherd children six times in 1917.

One of the three messages the Madonna is said to have given to the child visionaries -- the so-called 'Third Secret of Fatima' -- was what the Vatican has said was a prediction of the 1981 assassination attempt against the late Pope John Paul.

Benedict told reporters that he believed that interpretation of the Third Secret, revealed in 2000, could include the suffering the papacy and the Church would have to endure as a result of today's sexual abuse crisis.

"What we can see (in the Third Secret) are predictions about the suffering of the Church," he said.