Vatican City, Jul 24, 2019 / 13:00 pm
In an unscripted video message that appears to have been recorded on a cell phone, Pope Francis spoke of the need for an "apostolate of prevention" to protect minors from abuse.
"Prevention. Prevention. Because you never know where a child will be abused, where the child will be misled, where someone will teach him to smoke drugs, a form of corruption. Let us not think that only sexual abuse is the only type of abuse. Any type of corruption is an abuse of a child," Pope Francis said in Spanish in a YouTube video published on July 18 by the Pontifical University of Mexico.
The pope sent the video message to participants in a July 1-26 course on the protection of minors organized by CEPROME, the Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Formation for the Protection of Minors.
Pope Francis said that courses on abuse protection are important "for all children so that no one abuses them, no one prevents them from reaching Jesus."