Pope Francis seeks forgiveness in Canada for sex abuse at residential schools
- Pope Francis has spent the week in Canada seeking to atone for the Catholic Church’s treatment of indigenous children
- On Thursday the pope requested forgiveness from victims for the ‘evil’ of clergy sexual abuse at Church-run schools
Pope Francis asked for forgiveness for sexual abuse at Canadian schools for indigenous children run by Catholic orders, addressing a deep wound that many survivors wanted him to acknowledge during his apology tour in Canada.
At an evening vespers service with priests and nuns in the Quebec City cathedral on Thursday, the pope said the Church in Canada was on a new path after being “devastated by the evil perpetrated by some of its sons and daughters”.
“I think in particular of the sexual abuse of minors and vulnerable people, scandals that require firm action and an irreversible commitment,” the pope said on the penultimate day of his six-day visit to Canada.
“Together with you, I would like once more to ask forgiveness of all the victims. The pain and the shame we feel must become an occasion for conversion: never again!”
It was the first time the pope specifically addressed the issue of sexual abuse at the schools, where more than 150,000 indigenous children were separated from their families and brought to between 1870 and 1996.
The children were starved or beaten for speaking their native languages and many sexually abused in a system Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission called “cultural genocide”.