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Traveling on his first papal journey to the United States, Pope Benedict XVI (web|news|bio) confronted the clergy sex abuse scandal, saying that he was "deeply ashamed" of the problem, vowing to keep pedophiles out of the priesthood.
Benedict had only begun his six-day journey when he addressed sex abuse, the most painful issue for the Roman Catholic Church in the U.S.
The American church has paid more than $2 billion in costs related to the scandal since 1950 - the majority of that in just the last six years.
"It is a great suffering for the church in the United States, for the church in general and for me personally that this could happen," Benedict said. "It is difficult for me to understand how it was possible that priests betray in this way their mission to these children."
"I am deeply ashamed and we will do what is possible so this cannot happen again in the future," the pope said on the flight from Rome to Washington.
Benedict pledged that pedophiles would not be priests in the Catholic Church.
"We will absolutely exclude pedophiles from the sacred ministry," Benedict said. "It is more important to have good priests than many priests. We will do everything possible to heal this wound."
The pope's promise failed to mollify advocates for abuse victims. They said the problem is not just molester priests, but bishops and other church authorities who have let errant clergymen continue to serve even after repeated allegations.
"It's easy and tempting to continually focus on the pedophile priests themselves," said Peter Isely, a board member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. "It's harder, but crucial to focus on the broader problem - complicity in the rest of the church hierarchy."
Benedict's pilgrimage is the first trip by a pontiff to the United States since the case of a serial molester in Boston triggered a crisis that spread throughout the United States and beyond in 2002.
Hundreds of new accusations, many dating back decades, have surfaced each year since. There were 691 new accusations in 2007 alone, according to an annual report from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
As head of the Vatican agency that enforces adherence to Catholic doctrine, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was heavily involved in gaining Vatican approval for the reforms U.S. bishops proposed for the American church.
The bishops have since released several reports analyzing the scandal and have pledged that all credibly accused priests will be pulled from public ministry.
Pedophilia is "absolutely incompatible" with the priesthood, Benedict said.
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