...on March 15, the French media descended on the pilgrimage site in southwestern France, which is hosting a conference of the country's bishops. The journalists came to grill Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, who, as bearer of the ancient title "primat des Gaules," is France's most prominent Catholic cleric. As the cardinal of Lyon, France's second largest city, he runs a diocese rocked by a series of sexual abuse scandals. (The diocese of Lyons is also the oldest Catholic institution in France, stretching back to the Gallo-Roman period.) With the cicada-like clatter of clicking cameras, Barbarin declared he had "never, never, never" hid any act of pedophilia committed by his priests. Staring hard through his severe wire-rimmed glasses, Barbarin observed that none of these acts had happened under his watch. Besides, he noted, these crimes had passed the statute of limitations, so they could not be prosecuted.

...

The events in question stretch back 40 years. In 1971, a young and charismatic priest, Bernard Preynet, became leader of a troop of Catholic Boy Scouts near Lyons. During the 20 years he remained at this post, hundreds of adolescents passed through. La Parole Libérée (The Liberated Voice), an association formed by victims, charges that Preynet sexually abused as many as 60 youths. (The Tribune de Lyon offered a more conservative estimate, quoting an anonymous source, himself a victim, stating that Preynet "had abused 20 kids.&quot

In 1991, as rumors percolated, Preynat confessed to his superiors about his activity. Moreover, he sent letters to the families of the children he had molested, in which he confessed to his actions, insisted he was as scarred by them as were his young charges, and — remarkably — refused to quit his position. "How could I, like a thief during the night, leave the parish where I had lived for 20 years and did not do only bad things?"

The families did not pursue charges, and ecclesiastical authorities packed Preynat off to central France, where he served for nearly 25 years in several rural parishes. While no longer a scout leader, his duties nevertheless brought him into contact with children. When several former scouts, now in their 40s, finally brought charges against Preynat in 2015, the Lyonnais diocese lurched into action. They released a communiqué that confirmed the truth of the accusations, but also reassured their parishioners that the priest, a quarter of a century after his serial molestations in Lyon, had been removed from all pastoral duties and only now was "forbidden to have any contact with children."