No-one has done more to root out paedophilia than Church, says Francis

The Pope has defended the Church’s record on tackling the sexual abuse of children by priests, saying “no-one else has done more” to root out paedophilia.

“The Catholic Church is perhaps the only public institution to have acted with transparency and responsibility. No-one else has done more. Yet the Church is the only one to have been attacked,” Pope Francis said in an interview with Il Corriere della Sera daily.

Last month, the UN denounced the Vatican for failing to stamp out child sex abuse and allowing systematic cover-ups, calling on the Church to remove clergy suspected of raping or molesting children.

It accused the Vatican of systematically placing the “preservation of the reputation of the Church and the alleged offender over the protection of child victims” — an accusation which was heatedly rebuffed.

The Argentine pontiff said the abuse cases “are terrible because they leave very deep wounds”.

“The statistics on the phenomenon of violence against children are shocking, but they also clearly show that the great majority of abuses are carried out in family or neighbourhood environments,” he said.

Francis praised his predecessor Benedict XVI — the first pope to apologise to abuse victims — saying he had been “very courageous and opened up a path” to changing the Church’s attitude towards predatory priests.

In December, Francis created a commission to investigate sex crimes, enforce prevention, and care for victims.

Meanwhile, Francis said he finds the hype that is increasingly surrounding him “offensive”, even as the Vatican is marking the first anniversary of his March 13 election with stamps, coins, and a DVD.

Francis said he doesn’t appreciate the myth-making that has seen him depicted as a “Superpope” (as an Italian street artist recently painted him) who sneaks out at night to feed the poor (as Italian newspapers have suggested).

He has had to contend with a new bout of celebrity as My Pope hit Italian newsstands, a weekly gossip magazine devoted entirely to Francis. In addition, at his general audience, someone tried to give him a replica of an Oscar statue that said “Oscar Pope” on it.

“I don’t like ideological interpretations, this type of mythology of Pope Francis,” the Pope told Corriere.

“If I’m not mistaken, Sigmund Freud said that in every idealisation there’s an aggression. Depicting the Pope as a sort of Superman, a star, is offensive to me.”