Accessibility links

Breaking News

Vatican Official: Sex Abuse Scandal Is Church's 'Own 9/11'


FILE - Pope Francis shares a word with Prefect of the Papal Household Georg Ganswein (L) during his weekly general audience, in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, May 2, 2018.
FILE - Pope Francis shares a word with Prefect of the Papal Household Georg Ganswein (L) during his weekly general audience, in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, May 2, 2018.

A top Vatican official says the clerical sex abuse scandal is such a game-changing catastrophe for the Catholic Church that he called it the church's "own 9/11" on the 17th anniversary of the attacks in the U.S.

Archbishop Georg Gaenswein, a top aide to both retired Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, told a book presentation Tuesday that he by no means was comparing the scandal to the nearly 3,000 people killed in the U.S. on September 11, 2001.

But he said the years-long scandal, and recent revelations in the Pennsylvania grand jury report, showed just "how many souls have been wounded irrevocably and mortally by priests from the Catholic Church."

XS
SM
MD
LG