ULTIMO (AUSTRALIA)
Australian Broadcast Company
Sept. 19, 2019
By Michael Collett
When George Pell lost his appeal against his child sex abuse convictions last month, the Vatican noted that he still had one legal avenue remaining.
“The Holy See recalls that the Cardinal has always maintained his innocence throughout the judicial process and that it is his right to appeal to the High Court,” it said after the Victorian Court of Appeal handed down its judgment.
On Tuesday, the Cardinal’s legal team officially launched its bid to have his convictions quashed by Australia’s highest court, but that’s not the only process still underway.
In February, the Vatican announced its own investigation into the case, giving the task to the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith.
That investigative body was founded in 1542 under a different name: the Sacred Roman and Universal Inquisition.
That’s why the Congregation’s history is tied up with the Inquisition (note: the Spanish Inquisition was a separate institution, though the Roman Inquisition achieved its own infamy with its trial of Galileo for his belief that the Earth revolves around the Sun).
But not long after its creation, according to the Vatican, the institution’s responsibilities were extended to include “everything relating directly or indirectly to faith and morals”.
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