Pope Francis: Catholic church must be ashamed of sexual abuse in Belgium as king blasts response

Certainly the Pope has now become adept at profusely apologising for clerical abuse and has often met survivors both at the Vatican and on foreign visits.

In fact, some trips like one to Canada in 2022, have been entirely built around survivors. In that case it was to say “sorry” to indigenous people, who as children faced family-separation and abuse at Catholic-run schools.

But it has not always been the case. In 2018, he faced a wave of criticism for his vocal defence of a Chilean bishop, Juan Barros, who had been accused of covering up abuse perpetrated by a mentor of his.

Pope Francis apologised for his “grave mistakes” in handling the situation in what was something of a watershed moment in the way he handled the issue of abuse.

Since then, the Pope has made it compulsory for members of the clergy to report suspected abuse to their superiors, saying that whistleblowers must be free from intimidation – though the realities of applying this globally have proved inconsistent to say the least.

There have also been new rules whereby clergy who have committed abuse can “defrocked.” But critics have said the Pope erred too much on the side of showing “mercy” to such priests.

They point to some cases where influential members of clergy, including some who have even admitted misconduct, have either not been suspended from public ministry or not been publicly sanctioned.

At the meeting at the Vatican Embassy in Brussels, each of 15 survivors was given three minutes to address Pope Francis.

The ability to have such an opportunity cannot be underestimated, but survivor groups have long wanted such meetings to lead to far better systems being in place not just to punish those who abuse, but stop the abuse happening in the first place.