Francis reportedly uses profanity in front of "seminarians" and says "absolution" should never be refused

“Seminarians from Barcelona say they were scandalized when Pope Francis used cuss words at a Papal audience in December.  According to what the seminarians told Spanish media Francis ranted against ‘effing careerist who effed up the lives of others’ and ‘those who climb to show their three-letter a-word’.

The trainee priests were shocked when Francis also insisted that priests should never deny absolution to penitents in the confessional under any circumstances.  

Francis told the seminarians, ‘We can never deny absolution, because we become a vehicle for an evil, unjust, and moralistic judgment.’

The pope warned them, ‘not to be clerical to forgive everything’. He continued even, ‘[I]f we see that there is no intention to repent, we must forgive all.’

[Hunter Bradford:] Our Rome correspondent Dr. Jules Gomes tells us more about what happened.  Dr. Gomes, good to see you.  The Pope used the f-word?  I mean, is this a joke?  I… I want it to be a joke, I don't want this to be real, because popes have scripts when they talk most of the time.  I mean, sure, Pope Francis does speak off the cuff a lot, but if this is true, this is ridiculous.

[Jules Gomes:] Good evening, Hunter.  What Francis did at the audience was to toss aside the script that was prepared for him by the Vatican.  It is posted on the Vatican website with a little hint that he handed it out to the audience and then went on to deliver his impromptu remarks, which were actually.  He asked the seminarians to ask him questions and what he said was a response to some of their questions.  Well, he did something similar in November when he spoke to formators and rectors of seminaries from Latin America, and he threw aside his 12-page address.  And he said in Italian; he said that, you know, this is very heavy, you can read it if you want to later.

[Hunter Bradford:] Okay so, what you're saying is this isn't a one-off, that this has happened before, or am I hearing you incorrectly?

[Jules Gomes:] Well my sources told me last year, sources from Santa Marta where Francis lives, and they live in proximity to him.  They said they have heard him personally swear, you know, with their own ears.  And I was shocked, and I couldn't believe it at that time.  But listen to what Henry Sire writes in his book The Dictator Pope: The Inside Story of the Francis Papacy.  He goes by the pen name Marcantonio Colonna and he talks about how when the former Jesuit Superior General, that is, Father Peter Hans Kolvenbach wrote he had to write a report on Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio in 1991, you know, when he - Bergoglio - was being made auxiliary Bishop.  And he accused him of ‘a series of defects ranging from habitual use of vulgar language to deviousness’.  And then he said, ‘when the publicity cameras are off him, Pope Francis turns into a different figure: arrogant, dismissive of people, prodigal with bad language and notorious with furious outbursts of temper which are known to everyone from the Cardinals to the chauffeurs.’  He also quoted other commentators to confirm how Pope Francis' outbursts of temper, his rudeness towards his subordinates and his vulgar language has become notorious throughout the Vatican.  So this is a well-known fact, Hunter.

[Hunter Bradford:] Interesting, I mean, inside the Vatican, Jules, Pope Benedict XVI earned himself the nickname Rottweiler of the Vatican, and I think you may you may be the new one.  Dr. Gomes, thank you for your time.”