FILE - In this April 3, 2016 photo, French Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Archbishop of Lyon, leads a mass for migrants, in Lyon, central France. The French Catholic Church announced Tuesday, April 12, 2016 the creation a new independent commission made up of secular experts to advice bishops and help them handling the sensitive cases of child sex abuses by priests, amid growing concerns over newly-revealed pedophilia cases, especially in the Lyon diocese run by cardinal Barbarin. (AP Photo/Laurent Cipriani, File) (The Associated Press)
PARIS – The French Catholic Church has decided to set up a new independent commission made up of secular experts in charge of advising bishops and helping them handle the sensitive cases of child sex abuses by priests.
Monsignor Georges Pontier, chief of French bishops, announced Tuesday a series of measures to fight pedophilia inside the French church, amid growing concerns over newly-revealed child sex abuse cases, especially in the Lyon diocese run by Cardinal Philippe Barbarin.
Barbarin said that "the commission will be in place before the summer of 2016."
Pontier also said between 0.7 percent and 1.5 percent of priests in the world have been involved in sex child abuse cases, according to figures centralized by the Vatican. Pontier met with pope Francis in Rome last week.
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