AUSTRALIA
Canberra Times
The victims of sexual abuse say they felt stripped bare, humiliated, embarrassed, bullied, belittled and disbelieved, JUDY COURTIN writes
Valiant gentlemen,
Let us survey the vantage of the field
Call for some men of sound direction
Let’s want no discipline, make no delay,
For, lords, to-morrow is a busy day.
– Shakespeare, Richard III
The Catholic Church is nervous and preparing for battle. Legal fortifications are being erected, especially around the Sydney and Melbourne Archdioceses. Opening arguments for the defence are in position and the hierarchy is hunkering down.
Perhaps, like King Richard, the clergy offenders and their protectors are collectively dreaming of the ghosts of their victims – those who have survived and those who have died prematurely.
As Archbishop George Cardinal Pell and Archbishop Denis Hart plan their ecclesiastical battle strategy, or perhaps it is a strategy for self-survival, it is apparent they are trying to distance and isolate themselves and their archdioceses from the rest of the Catholic Church in Australia.
Calls for a Royal Commission in NSW are escalating and the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into the handling of child abuse by religious and other organisations is looming.
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