The following report is quite distressing because it suggests that the anti-Pell (i.e., anti-Church) elements driving this long drawn out campaign to discredit the Australian cardinal is persistent and far from over.
Originally, I was under the impression that Pell was being investigated all this time for covering up about sex abuses committed by priests under his jurisdiction. So I am shocked (apparently, I had been reading all previous reports wrongly) that it now appears there are accusations – and more than one – that he himself may have committed inappropriate conduct with minors not just before he became a bishop but even when he was already Archbishop of Sydney.
The accusations against Pell became international news at the time Benedict XVI was considering to name him Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops back in 2010, at which time the accusations only had to do with covering up for offending priests. Nonetheless, because of the nature of the position to which Pell would have been named, Benedict XVI passed him up and chose Cardinal Marc Ouellet of Canada instead.
The accusations against Pell were renewed and taken to a new level, with formal investigations and all, shortly after Pell was named to head the new Vatican super-dicastery, the Secretariat for the Economy, which as originally conceived, would have made Pell the second most powerful man in the Vatican after the pope himself.
The anti-Pell campaign was revved up in Australia even as Pell’s super-dicastery started being divested by the pope of important powers which were devolved to the Secretariat of State and to one of the Vatican agencies nominally under the Secretariat for the Economy, the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See (APSA, from its Italian acronym).
Pell has therefore been fighting on two fronts – internally, within the Vatican, and internationally, against his enemies in Australia. Except that now, he himself apparently is in the investigative bullseye for inappropriate conduct that he allegedly committed himself.
Pell’s entire history before these accusations was sterling for his firm and steadfast orthodoxy, a figure who has never been a lightweight (literally and figuratively) and is arguably the most outstanding Church prelate ever to come out of Australia and Oceania.
As much as I still seethe over his seemingly denigratory statements about Benedict XVI shortly after the latter stepped down as pope, I pray that the accusations against him will be judged to be unfounded, for his sake and that of the Church.
Reports suggest Cardinal Pell
could face sex abuse charges in Australia
May 16, 2017
According to multiple media reports, Cardinal George Pell, currently the head of the Vatican’s Secretariat for the Economy, could face legal charges in his native Australia over decades-old allegations of sexual abuse.
Police in the Australian state of Victoria, in which Pell’s home Diocese of Ballarat is located, confirmed on Tuesday they “received advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions relating to a current investigation into historical sexual assault allegations.” Pell has long denied the allegations vehemently.
The police investigations surround accusations that Pell inappropriately touched two young boys while swimming in the late 70s, and that he exposed himself in a change room in a surf club in the 1980s.
Those allegations were investigated by Victoria’s SANO unit, which was set up in 2012 to look into new and historic cases of sex abuse at religious and other non-governmental organizations.
Pell became an auxiliary bishop of Melbourne in 1987, before becoming archbishop of the same archdiocese 9 years later. He was moved to Sydney in 2001, and was appointed a cardinal by Pope John Paul II in 2003. Pope Francis picked him to take charge of the Vatican’s finances in 2014, and he moved to Rome.
Pell cooperated with the SANO investigation, and agreed to be interviewed by detectives in the Vatican last October. The investigators returned the findings to prosecutors earlier this year. Now that the Director of Public Prosecutions has given its advice to the police, it is up to the them to decide whether or not to pursue charges.
Police spokesperson Creina O’Grady told local reporters that detectives “will now take time to consider that advice. “As with any investigation, it will be a decision for Victoria Police as to whether charges are laid,” she said. “As
this remains an ongoing investigation, we will not be commenting further at this time.”
When the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported on the investigation in July 2016, Pell’s office released a statement “emphatically and unequivocally” rejecting any allegations of sexual abuse.
“The cardinal’s conduct has been repeatedly scrutinized over many years, including before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into the Handling of Child Abuse by Religious and Other Organizations and according to leaked reports, by Victorian Police’s SANO Taskforce,” the 2016 statement said.
“The cardinal does not wish to cause any distress to any victim of abuse. However, claims that he has sexually abused anyone, in any place, at any time in his life are totally untrue and completely wrong,” it continued.
“He denies the allegations absolutely, and says that they, and any acceptance of them by the ABC, are nothing more than a scandalous smear campaign which appears to be championed by the ABC. If there was any credibility in any of these claims, they would have been pursued by the Royal Commission by now,” the statement said.
Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse was set up in 2013 to examine the history of sexual abuse in religious and educational institutions, as well as other organizations dealing with young people. It works closely with Victoria’s SANO taskforce, and other local agencies.
On Monday, a new book was released in Australia detailing further accusations against Pell.
Cardinal: The Rise And Fall of George Pell, was written by Louise Milligan, a journalist with the the ABC, and includes allegations Pell abused choirboys in the 1990s, when he was Archbishop of Melbourne.
Pell’s lawyers issued a statement Saturday stating the cardinal will not respond to the latest allegations made in the book, other than to restate that “any allegations of child abuse made against him are completely false.”
The statement also said the book was a “deliberate attempt to influence the public opinion in a manner that would make it impossible for our client to receive a fair hearing in court should he be charged” and that Pell “repeats his vehement and consistent denials of any and all such accusations, and stands by all the evidence he has given to the royal commission.”
According to the royal commission, nearly 10 percent of the priests of the Diocese of Ballarat had an allegation of sexual abuse brought against them between 1950 and 2010.
When asked about Pell during his inflight press conference after leaving World Youth Day in Poland on July 31, 2016, Francis said “one must not judge before justice judges.”
Francis also warned against a “media trial” and the “judgement of gossip.”
Justice must run its course,
says Sydney archbishop on
abuse claims against Cardinal Pell
Like everyone else, he is innocent till proven guilty
SYDNEY, May 17, 2017 (CNS) – Public prosecutors have submitted recommendations to Victoria Police on whether to try Australian Cardinal George Pell on decades-old abuse allegations, but their advice has not been made public.
Until police decide how to proceed, Sydney Archbishop Anthony Fisher said he will not be commenting on the case. "Justice must be left to run its course," Archbishop Fisher said in a statement May 17.
Archbishop Fisher said Cardinal Pell, currently head of the Vatican Secretariat for the Economy, "has cooperated in every way with multiple police, parliamentary and Royal Commission investigations."
"Everyone supports just investigation of complaints, but the relentless character attacks on Cardinal Pell, by some, stand the principle of innocent-until-proven-guilty on its head," Archbishop Fisher said. "Australians have a right to expect better from their legal systems and the media. Even churchmen have a right to 'a fair go.'"
Last July, allegations surfaced in a report by the Australian Broadcasting Corp. featuring several people who accused Cardinal Pell of sexual assault; at least one of the accusations had been found to be unsubstantiated by an Australian court in 2002. Some accusations dated to the late 1970s, when Cardinal Pell was a priest in Ballarat, Australia.
He served as archbishop of Melbourne 1996-2001 and archbishop of Sydney 2001-2014 before being asked to serve at the Vatican.
At the time the allegations surfaced, Cardinal Pell dismissed them as "nothing more than a scandalous smear campaign," and a statement issued by his office said that "claims that he has sexually abused anyone, in any place, at any time in his life are totally untrue and completely wrong."
In October, Australian police questioned Cardinal Pell in Rome regarding the accusations.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 18/05/2017 15:24]