Australian child sex abuse victims are on Tuesday preparing to fly to Rome, with a plan to watch Cardinal George Pell give evidence via videolink to Australia’s Royal Commission into child abuse within the Catholic Church.
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Cardinal Pell previously succeeded in a bid to remain in Rome after the inquiry accepted a doctor’s report which said he was too sick to return to Australia to testify.
The crowd-funding campaign which was conceived late last week has more than doubled its initial goal of $55K to $125K.
But conservative media personality Steve Price has defended Cardinal Pell against Minchin’s musical attack.
Survivors hoped to raised $55,000 which would allow up to 15 representatives from Ballarat to be in Rome when the Cardinal gives his evidence at the end of this month.
Tim Minchin has released a new song, aimed at a leading Cardinal embroiled in a paedophile scandal.
“I don’t think it’s altogether helped by having songs about a key witness, calling him scum, and a buffoon, and a coward and that sort of thing before the commission does its task”, Father Brennan told ABC’s the Drum program.
Pell, 74, has been ordered to give evidence in the wake of allegations he suppressed and continues to suppress evidence of instances of child sex abuse while working as a priest in the small city of Ballarat during the 1970s and 1980s.
In his lyrics he calls Cardinal Pell “scum” after the cardinal claimed he was too ill to travel.
“The extra money as always, as noted on the GoFundMe page, will go to mental health services in Ballarat for survivors of sexual abuse by clergy”, she said.
Ms Knight said if the church could afford such legal costs, it could afford to fly over survivors seeking answers from Australia’s most senior Catholic for abuse they endured at the hands of the church. “We can go right to where they would never expect victims to hold them accountable which is in the Vatican”. He is a Cardinal, regardless of what you make of him. Come Home (Cardinal Pell) is also available on iTunes.
However, his fellow panellists Peter Helliar, Waleed Aly and Carrie Bickmore were more supportive of Minchin.
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In releasing his song, Minchin said: ‘The whole think stinks to high hell, and many people in Australia are very, very angry…not least of all, the survivors in Ballarat, where abuse was sickeningly rife.
