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The pope's comments arrived Tuesday aboard the papal flight from the Baltic states, when he answered questions from reporters for about 50 minutes.
On Tuesday, Francis met with youth in Tallinn, Estonia, where he also acknowledged the scandal of church abuse and said Catholic leaders needed to be "converted" to address the concerns of young people.
"Young people are outraged by the hypocrisy of the elderly," Francis told reporters on Tuesday. "They are outraged by the war, they are scandalized by the incongruity, they are outraged by the corruption and as part of this corruption … of sexual abuse."
"There are accusations against the church," continued Francis. "We all know it, we know the statistics, I will not repeat it, but even if it was only a priest to abuse a girl or a young boy, it's monstrous because this man was chosen by God. "
The pope added that the church "realized that she had to fight" the abuses of "different way" and "lately (the abuses) have diminished".
According to church statistics and an investigative report by a grand jury in Pennsylvania, charges of clerical sexual assault revealed that the "big" charges in the state had occurred before the early 2000s.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops strengthened some of its ill-treatment reporting policies in 2002 after the latest massive sexual abuse scandal.
Still, some experts say it's hard to know if the abuse has decreased, as it usually takes years, if not decades, for survivors to report it.
"In the old days, these things were hidden," the minister told reporters on Tuesday. "They were concealed in the houses when the uncle raped the little niece or the father raped her children.They were covered because the shame was very great."
"That's what people thought in the last century," continued Francis. "There is a principle that helps me a lot to interpret the story.A historical event must be interpreted with the hermeneutics of the time, not with the hermeneutics of the past. ; aujourd & # 39; hui ".
Take Pennsylvania, for example, said the pope.
"Look at the report and you will see that when the church started to realize that, then we gave everything to stop it."
The pope also said that he and the church watchdog, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, had kidnapped the guilty priests.
"And lately, I've received a lot of guilt verdicts from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and … I've said go ahead, but I'm not sure. Have never signed a request for forgiveness after a verdict of guilty, do not negotiate about it, there is no negotiation ".
