NARACOORTA (AUSTRALIA)
Naracoorte Herald
March 19, 2019
By Lee Curnow
As the world followed Cardinal George Pell’s sex crimes trial, one Apsley resident was watching closer than most.
Rosemary Nolan is one of hundreds of western Victorians who have been directly or indirectly affected by the actions of Cardinal Pell and his cohort of so-called “paedophile priests”.
Rosemary’s family – and many other people she knows from her time growing up in Edenhope – were impacted forever by a three-year stint in their town by now convicted paedophile priest Gerald Ridsdale.
“Ridsdale arrived in 1976 in Edenhope and was there for three years. Eventually it came out that whilst he was in Edenhope, he was abusing boys,” Rosemary recalls.
“He was the first of the modern priests, he had a flash car, he was extremely friendly. We were so naive, we didn’t even know there was such a thing as a paedophile.”
Sadly, Rosemary’s brother John Ruth became one of Ridsdale’s victims during that time.]
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