Girl Asks Pope Francis: Why Does God Allow Children To Become Prostitutes?

Pope Francis did not have an easy time in the Philippines. Before his papal mass to a record-breaking six million Filipinos, the pope received a heart-wrenching question from a little orphan girl, who was brought to tears while asking.

Twelve-year-old Glyzelle Iris Palomar asked Pope Francis an important question, according to DNA.

“Many children are abandoned by their parents. Many of them became victims and bad things have happened to them, like drug addiction and prostitution. Why does God allow this to happen, even if the children are not at fault? Why is it that only a few people help us?”

Palomar was rescued by a shelter in a Church-run community. She started to weep as she asked the question, and Pope Francis hugged her. The pope made no attempt to answer the little girl’s question.

“She is the only one who has put forward a question for which there is no answer and she was not even able to express it in words but rather in tears.”

CNN reports that in the Philippines, anywhere from 60,000 to 100,000 children are victims of human trafficking. The problem is aggravated by the percentage of impoverished people, which is about 36 percent of the Philippines population.

According to the Daily Mail, Pope Francis addressed the child’s touching question into his papal mass. As previously reported by the Inquisitr, that mass was attended by an astounding six million people.

“We need to see each child as a gift to be welcomed, cherished and protected. And we need to care for our young people, not allowing them to be robbed of hope and condemned to a life on the streets.”

The pope urged people to keep their children away from sin, explaining that the devil “distracts us with the promise of ephemeral pleasures, superficial pastimes.”

In another address, this time before 30,000 young people at a Catholic university, Pope Francis more directly discussed the plight of children.

“I invite each one of you to ask yourselves, ‘Have I learned how to weep, how to cry when I see a hungry child, a child on the street who uses drugs, a homeless child, an abandoned child, an abused child, a child that society uses as a slave’?”

The pope then moved on to talk about women, and what they have to offer the world. In doing so, Pope Francis passingly mentioned how this trip to Asia would be his last in the Philippines.

“Women have much to tell us in today’s society. At times, we are too ‘machista’ and don’t allow room for women. But women are capable of seeing things with a different angle from us, with a different eye, and pose questions that we men are not able to understand… so when the next pope comes to Manila, let’s please have more women among you.”

The pope may have received more from his Asia trip than he bargained for. After he heads back to the Vatican, Pope Francis must prepare for his next big challenge: climate change.

[Image Credit: Christoph Wagener/Wikimedia Commons]