WARSAW (POLAND)
Reuters
May 13, 2019
Polish Nobel Peace Prize laureate Lech Walesa has urged the Catholic Church to prevent further sexual abuse of children by members of its clergy after a new documentary film showed his priest to be one of the accused.
The film “Just don’t tell anyone”, which shows people confronting priests with accusations that they abused them as children, has attracted nearly 7 million views since it was posted on YouTube on Saturday. It presents allegations that known pedophiles were shifted between parishes.
One of the clergymen featured was Franciszek Cybula, who served as Walesa’s priest for 15 years – from 1980 when he co-founded the trade union Solidarnosc which helped bring about the fall of Communism, through to his becoming Poland’s first democratically elected president in 1990 and until his term ended in 1995.
“It is sad for me that I found out that my chaplain, my confessor, was behaving so badly,” Walesa was quoted as saying by Polska The Times daily on Monday.
Poland is one of Europe’s most devout countries and Catholic priests enjoy a high level of social prestige. Nearly 85 percent of Poland’s 38 million-strong population identify as Roman Catholics and around 12 million attend mass every Sunday.
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