The
election of Pope Francis, in 2013, had the effect, among other things,
of displacing the painful story of priestly sexual abuse that had
dominated public awareness of the Church during much of the eight-year
papacy of his predecessor.
The sense that the Church, both during the
last years of Benedict and under Francis, had begun to deal more
forcefully with the issue created a desire in many, inside and outside
the Church, to move on. But recent events suggest that we take another
careful look at this chapter of Church history before turning the page.
