Time is running out for the Pope to pacify the faithful’s anger

The waves of scandal over clerical sexual abuse, and the Vatican’s weak response, are pushing lay Catholics to breaking point

When Pope Francis ascends the steps of his plane at Dublin airport on Sunday evening at the end of his 36-hour trip to Ireland, even he – the people’s pontiff, the champion of the poor – might feel a sense of relief on entering the cocoon of Aer Lingus’s business class.

He will leave a country in which the wounds of clerical abuse are still raw, and where visceral anger is building rather than fading. On Saturday, Francis again acknowledged a “grave scandal” and “repugnant crimes”. But the question for survivors and increasing numbers of the faithful is: what is he going to do about it?

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from World news | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2NfGdKj