LourdesPope Leo called clerical sex abuse the Church’s own scourge.
He also pressed France’s lawmakers on assisted dying days after they legalized it.
A 2021 inquiry found clergy had abused 330,000 minors in France over 7 decades, prompting his renewed call for vigilance.
“Medicine must never become the servant of programmed death!” said Pope Leo XIV.
Leo meets 7 French abuse survivors later Sunday, in a meeting some victims call too small to matter.
How each outlet framed it
drawn from 100+ reports worldwide
- Le Monde.fr
- RTE.ie
- emphasizes disconnect between pope's euphemistic framing and documented abuse scale (330k minors over 70 years)
- IOL
- emphasizes pope's direct victim meetings and explicit naming of 'painful scourge'; foregrounds 330k-minors-over-70-years historical scope
- The New Indian Express leans critical
- centers pope's assisted-dying opposition ('false compassion') and culture-war messaging over abuse reckoning
- Anadolu Ajansı
Sources: Le Monde.fr, RTE.ie, IOL, The New Indian Express, Anadolu Ajansı