BishopAccountability.org

Abuse unseen but 'on the radar', Cardinal George Pell tells commission

By Rachel Browne
Sydney Morning Herald
February 29, 2016

http://www.smh.com.au/national/abuse-unseen-but-on-the-radar-cardinal-george-pell-tells-commission-20160229-gn65xm.html

Cardinal George Pell.

Cardinal Pell briefly lived at the St Alipius presbytery in Ballarat with convicted paedophile Gerald Ridsdale
Photo by Simon O'Dwyer

Cardinal Pell said he had heard 'fleeting references' to former Christian brother Edward Dowlan which he concluded 'might be paedophilia activity'.

George Pell (right) with now-disgraced priest Gerald Ridsdale in 1993.

[with video]

Cardinal George Pell was aware of the existence of clerical sexual abuse in the early 1970s but failed to recognise widespread offending when he was a junior priest in Ballarat, despite gossip that Christian Brothers there were assaulting children.

The church . . . has mucked things up, has let people down. 

George Pell

Cardinal Pell gave his long-awaited evidence into his knowledge of alleged sexual offences in Ballarat to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse by video link from Rome on Monday.

In a hearing expected to last four days, Cardinal Pell told the commission that abuse by Catholic clergy was "on the radar" in the 1970s due to offending by Monsignor John Day, who died in 1978.

The commission heard a 1971 police investigation found that Monsignor Day had molested children in Victoria over 13 years. 

Cardinal Pell told the commission Monsignor Day's case made him aware of sexual abuse among clergy but he did not recognise signs of abuse among Christian Brothers in Ballarat, where he was assistant parish priest from 1973-83.

He told the commission he'd heard of "problems" at St Patrick's College where much of the sexual abuse took place but had not received specific allegations of sexual abuse perpetrated by Christian Brothers.

The commission heard the "problems" included a brother who would kiss children and swim naked with them, another who would put his hands down boys' trousers and a third who would take boys on long drives.

Counsel assisting the commission Gail Furness SC said one former St Patrick's student gave evidence that the boys who were being abused were known as the brothers' "bum buddies".

She put it to Cardinal Pell that a "significant number in the community" were aware students were being abused.

Cardinal Pell told the commission he heard "fleeting references" to former Christian brother Edward Dowlan which "I concluded might be paedophilia activity"  but could not recall specific allegations.

When Dowlan left the school, Cardinal Pell told the commission he did not "know the reasons why or whether they were indiscretions or crimes."

He said he never heard "rumours of sexual misconduct" about Gerald Ridsdale, with whom he briefly lived at the St Alipius presbytery in Ballarat.

Ridsdale is serving a prison sentence for multiple offences against children spanning decades.

"We weren't alert in those ways anything like the way we are alert today," Cardinal Pell said.

The Cardinal, who now runs the Vatican's finances, was called to give evidence as part of a hearing into alleged abuses in Ballarat and Melbourne during the period when he was at the dioceses.

The commission accepted evidence he was too ill to fly to Australia to attend in person.

Cardinal Pell has blamed individual failures rather than the Catholic Church system for the inaction on the clergy sexual abuse which went on for decades.

 "I'm not here to defend the indefensible," he said.

"The church has made enormous mistakes and is working to remedy those, but the church ... has mucked things up, has let people down."

He said the Catholic Church in Australia was responding to the abuse which he said was not due to systemic causes.

"There are very few countries in the world which have advanced as far as the Catholic Church has in Australia in putting procedures into place nearly 20 years ago," he said.

"I think the faults overwhelmingly have been personal faults, personal failures rather than structures."

Allegations of child sexual abuse were generally not believed in the 1970s, Cardinal Pell told the commission..

"Some [allegations] were dismissed in scandalous circumstances," he said.

"Plausible allegations were not followed up sufficiently. These were reasonable complaints that were dealt with very poorly.

"The instinct was to protect the community of the church from shame. I'm not sure at that stage there was too much concern about protecting assets."

The hearing continues.

Contact: rbrowne@fairfaxmedia.com.au




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