Church Will Weed Out Paedophile Priests, Pope Tells Us Cardinals

The Pope signalled an intensification of the hunt for paedophiles within the Roman Catholic church yesterday when he told American cardinals summoned to an emergency summit in Rome that sex abuse by priests was a crime.

Hinting at a new policy of zero tolerance to end the scandals engulfing the US church, he apologised to victims and lamented a crisis of sexual morality.

"The abuse which has caused this crisis is by every standard wrong and rightly considered a crime by society: it is also an appalling sin in the eyes of God. People need to know that there is no place in the priesthood and religious life for those who would harm the young."

The speech, made in English to a closed session of cardinals and senior officials, is expected to galvanise a crackdown in the US and elsewhere and usher in a new era of reporting abusers to civil authorities. The Vatican released the text.

The Pope summoned the US cardinals to Rome in response to the abuse scandal that has hit one diocese after another, triggering a media frenzy and lawsuits which could drain hundreds of millions of dollars from church coffers.

In his speech, the Pope recognised the damage had been compounded by bishops and cardinals who moved abusers to other posts after complaints were made, rather than dismissing them and notifying the civil authorities.

"Because of the great harm done by some priests the church itself is viewed as distressed and many are offended at the way in which the church's leaders are perceived to have acted in this matter."

"To the victims and their families, wherever they may be, I express my profound sense of solidarity and concern. The abuse of the young is a grave symptom of a crisis affecting not only the church but society as a whole," he said.

According to a recent opinion poll in the US, the church has a big task ahead if it is to rescue its image. Three-quarters of Americans think the church has done a poor job of handling sex abuse, according to the poll by the Washington Post and ABC News.

Victim groups welcomed the papal intervention but called for action.

Robert Sherman, a lawyer for alleged victims, told CNN: "You can't have the cardinals simply dealing with themselves on this issue, it's like asking the fox what's going on in the hen house."

Analysts said yesterday's speech was probably one of the most painful of John Paul's 23-year pontificate.

The failure to respond sooner was blamed on aides' reluctance to reveal the extent of the scandals.

For an organisation said to think in terms of centuries, the church gave cardinals little warning of the summit: one week. Cynics said that the prospect of the US church, the Vatican's cash cow, being bankrupted by lawsuits provided the spur for action.

At first officials downplayed the crisis as a problem caused by a culture of sexual licentiousness and affecting only the US, despite similar cases in Poland, Mexico, Britain, Ireland, Canada and Australia.

The Vatican now seems braced for a widening scandal.

Yesterday a senior Italian cardinal, Ersilio Tonini, said Italy and other Catholic strongholds would soon learn they too had a serious problem and asked parents, teachers and journalists to help root out abusers.

The two-day summit, which concludes today, will influence which guidelines the American cardinals will recommend to bishops at a meeting in Dallas in June. Among expected moves is the intensification of checks on suspected paedophile priests.

The Pope's speech is expected to bolster those calling for a zero tolerance policy involving clerics being expelled and civil authorities being notified after the first proven incident of abuse.

"It's the strongest language I've seen about what we call at home 'zero tolerance'," Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles said.

However, Cardinal Francis George of Chicago said the issue was uncertain because the Pope spoke of the possibility of "Christian conversion, that radical decision to turn from sin and back to God."

A mooted move to force the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law of Boston, who is accused of the worst mishandling of sex abuse cases, did not materialise.