The Australian Cardinal was a priest in the city of Ballarat in the early 1970s and is being questioned on his knowledge of widespread sexual abuse committed by members of the clergy in the area over a period of decades.
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Australian victims of child sex abuse who are in Rome watching the testimony of Cardinal George Pell have said they want a meeting with Pope Francis.
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses in to Child Sexual Abuse heard the Sunbury parish priest killed a bird in front of children, showed them a dead body in a coffin, held a gun to the heads of parishioners, threatened to stab a child in a church and repeatedly molested youngsters.
Q: “I want to suggest to you that your interest was not in helping [David Ridsdale] but in trying to keep him from going to the police”.
Pell, who said this week he has the full backing of Pope Francis, has told the Commission that the church made “enormous mistakes” and “catastrophic” choices by refusing to believe abused children, shuffling abusive priests from parish to parish and over-relying on counselling of priests to solve the problem.
When he was reminded by counsel for David Ridsdale that he had told the commission on Tuesday that he had “no reason to turn my mind to the extent of the evils that Ridsdale had perpetrated”, the cardinal said he could not remember saying that.
“I have never expressed such a view, but I must confess the idea has occurred to me”, Cardinal Pell said.
Ms Hatcher said the day of evidence given by Cardinal Pell, which was extended by one hour, was grueling and hard.
“I lived there, I helped out at the weekends”, he said.
What was most interesting about Dr Pell’s explanations is he also believes people kept him in the dark because they knew he would be outspoken and reject any attempts to move paedophile priests around parishes.
“They realized very clearly I was not cut from the same cloth”, Pell said.
Cardinal Pell told the inquiry he was not adequately briefed by the Catholic Education Office, who told him about the allegations against Searson in a “non-specific way”.
Cardinal Pell insisted he was not lying. Pell denied both propositions.
The royal commission – which is Australia’s highest form of investigation – is investigating how Pell dealt with abuse allegations as a priest, educator and adviser to Mulkearns, as well as how the Melbourne archdiocese responded to allegations of abuse, including when Pell served as a Melbourne auxiliary bishop.
The Royal Commission in December accepted medical advice that 85-year-old Mulkearns was dying and was unfit to testify.
Yet his latest testimony revealed how little weight this carries in a world that has learned so much in a few years about what Pell and those who surrounded him knew about children being sexually abused, how much children suffered and how little the church cared for them.
Given the history of systematic coverups of child abuse within the Catholic Church, the fact that its No. 3 is rather blasé about this particular case should surprise no one and dismay everyone. McClellan grilled the cardinal on his response. ‘And of course I regret that that situation was there and that I didn’t have the information to do something to help.
The majority have been disappointed with Pell’s failing memory on many questions of what he knew about abuse by clergy.
Abuse survivors in Rome were expected to meet behind closed doors with Cardinal Pell after his testimony by video link.
“George Pell has consistently pointed the blame elsewhere, accused everybody of being a liar and deceit”.
He said it was “completely untrue” that he didn’t have much interest in what David Ridsdale told him about the crimes of his uncle.
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The victims said Wednesday that they had requested a meeting with the pope before they return to Australia on Friday. Larry is our main news editor.
