Pope Benedict XVI said Thursday he could understand why people were turning their backs on the Catholic Church after the recent sex abuse scandals, as he began his first state visit to Germany. At the start of a four-day trip to his homeland, the pontiff also took a conciliatory tone with protesters who planned to rally in the free-wheeling, increasingly secular capital as long as they were “civil”.
“I can understand that in the face of such reports, people, especially those close to victims, would say ‘this isn’t my Church anymore’,” the pope, 84, told reporters on his plane from Rome in reference to widespread abuse by clergy. But he asked for patience as the Church grapples with enduring outrage over the scandals that has threatened to cloud his visit to Germany, where his election six years ago had met with an outpouring of joy.
The Church “is a net of the Lord which catches both good fish and bad,” he said ahead of his arrival, which was met with a 21-gun salute and children bearing flowers under glorious autumn sunshine. Organisers say at least 20,000 opponents of the pope, including abuse survivors, gays, feminists and atheists, will gather behind police barricades in Berlin later Thursday. Critics say Ratzinger is out of touch with modern life with his rigorous dogma on artificial contraception, homosexuality and the role of women in the Church. Police were enforcing a lockdown near the Bundestag parliament building, as well as in the largely Muslim neighbourhood around the apostolic nunciature, the Vatican embassy, where he will spend the night. Benedict’s papacy has been marred by revelations last year of rampant abuse by priests over several decades, which helped drive more than 181,000 from the German Church – 57,000 more than in 2009. The Vatican has indicated it is likely the pontiff will meet with victims, as he has on previous trips. Benedict said demonstrations were “normal in a free society marked by strong secularism.”
“One can’t object” to such protests, he added. “I respect those who speak out.” However the head of a prominent abuse victims’ association, Matthias Katsch of Eckiger Tisch, said the Church must do more to convince many of those who suffered at the hands of its clergy. “I personally did not leave the Church because I am convinced that change is possible,” the 48-year-old, who says he was molested while attending an elite Catholic school in Berlin, told AFP. “But if you have lost hope then you must leave to demonstrate to the Church that it is on the wrong path.” The pope said there were various factors driving people from the Church. “We are witnessing a growing indifference to religion in society, which considers the issue of truth as something of an obstacle in its decision-making, and instead gives priority to utilitarian considerations,” he said after meeting President Christian Wulff, himself a remarried Catholic.
