Polish Catholics get a new leader as the church struggles to reckon with sexual abuse

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — The leaders of Poland’s influential Catholic Church have chosen moderate Archbishop Tadeusz Wojda to be their new principal, at a time when the church is struggling to reckon with the abuse of minors by some Polish clergy. The number of Poles attending mass has also fallen sharply. Bishops and archbishops chose Wojda, the archbishop of Gdansk, as the new head of the Polish Episcopate for a five-year term. In recent years, a number of Poland’s archbishops and bishops have retired or stepped down, with the Vatican’s approval, for ignoring or trying to cover up abuses cases and for downplaying the trauma of the victims.