Child & Youth Protection

Pope Francis will meet members of Canada’s Indigenous communities in late July, visiting the cities of Edmonton, Quebec and Iqaluit in Nunavut, the country’s most northern region.

Pope Francis asked his safeguarding commission to provide an annual audit of what the church is doing to protect minors and what needs to change, as well as to urge bishops’ conferences to set up special “centers” where victims can be heard and find accompaniment toward “healing and justice.”

Archbishop Georg Gänswein, private secretary of retired Pope Benedict XVI, has defended his boss and criticized the Munich abuse report, which made international headlines when it was released in January.