“To generalize, to look at a whole category of people is never legitimate,” said Archbishop Charles Scicluna, one of the Vatican’s point man in the fight against sex abuse. Homosexuality and heterosexuality are “human conditions,” he said, adding, “they are not something that predisposes to sin.”

Acknowledging that the church is currently “in a state of crisis and shame,” Sister Veronica Openibo urged church leaders to “acknowledge that our mediocrity, hypocrisy and complacency have brought us to this disgraceful and scandalous place we find ourselves as a church.”

“No bishop may say to himself, ‘The problem of abuse in the church does not concern me because things are different in my part of the world,’” the archbishop of Bombay told bishops gathered in Rome.

Cardinal Tagle urged church leaders not to shy away from acknowledging the pain of victims.

The central thesis of the 576-page book is that “the more a prelate is homophobic, the more likely it is that he is himself gay.”

A sentence of laicization—sometimes referred to colloquially as defrocking—would complete a stunning fall from grace for the former cardinal.

Pope Francis has downplayed expectations about the Feb. 21-24 summit at the Vatican on the sexual abuse crisis, but many hope it is a step toward a system with more accountability.

Bishop John Stowe of Lexington, Ky., wrote that in a newspaper column this week that he was "astonished" that students at the March for Life would be aligned with the "Make America Great Again" movement.

According to a report released by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University on Jan. 22, just 33 percent of bishops in the United States think the church “should” ordain women as deacons.

Included on the list is John T. Ryan, S.J., who from 1989 to 1994 was an associate editor for development at America.