Pope Francis has admitted that even priests and nuns give into temptation and watch online pornography warning that it “weakens the priestly heart”
The Pope made the comments during a convention with seminarians in Rome, in response to a question about how the new generation of clergy could use social media tools to spread a Christian message.
He told the group to avoid temptation by deleting adult apps from their phones.
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Sky news reports: Francis, responding to a question in the Vatican, said: “It is a vice that has so many people, so many lay people, so many lay women and also priests and nuns. The devil enters from there.”
He said he wasn’t referring only to “criminal pornography like that of child abuse”, but also to “normal pornography”.
The Pope urged prospective priests to delete any such sites from their phone “so you won’t have the temptation in hand”.
Francis warned: “I tell you, it is something that weakens the soul. It weakens the soul. The devil enters from there: he weakens the priestly heart.”
In 2020 there was embarrassment for the Vatican when the Pope’s official Instagram account liked a revealing photo from Brazilian glamour model Natalia Garibotto.
She claimed to have gained 600,000 followers as a result and Vatican staff launched an investigation into how it happened.
In Monday’s comments, reported on the Vatican website, the Pope also addressed the digital world generally.
