AUSTRALIA
The Australian
AAP
A Catholic bishop now says he was rash when he told a pedophile priest some child sex abuse victims were trying to get “some easy cash”.
The child abuse royal commission has heard Bishop Brian Finnigan, then Ballarat diocese vicar-general, told convicted pedophile Gerald Francis Ridsdale in 1994: “Some of these fellows now see the opportunity to obtain some easy cash.”
Bishop Finningan, now a Brisbane auxiliary bishop, said it was a rash statement and not his view of child sex abuse victims who sought damages from the church.
“It’s a rash statement not given much thought to at the time when it was written,” Bishop Finnigan told the commission.
Bishop Finnigan said he could not remember details of a number of meetings where the movement of priests was discussed, from 1979 to 1998 when he was bishop’s secretary, a member of the College of Consultors and then vicar-general.
Challenged about his lack of memory of important issues about priests offending against children by counsel assisting the commission Angus Stewart SC, Bishop Finnigan said he did not recall them.
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