Cardinal George Pell Says Sex Abuse Was Downplayed By Vatican In 1990s
Australian Cardinal George Pell arrives for a meeting, at the Vatican, Monday, March 4, 2013. Cardinals from around the world have gathered inside the Vatican for their first round of meetings before the conclave to elect the next pope, amid scandals inside and out of the Vatican and the continued reverberations of Benedict XVI's decision to retire. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)
Posted: 03/24/2014 10:52 am EDT Updated: 03/24/2014 10:59 am EDT
VATICAN CITY (AP) — The Vatican's new No. 3 has accused Holy See officials of downplaying the clerical sex abuse scandal in the 1990s, saying they were generally skeptical of victims and often considered them "enemies of the church."
Cardinal George Pell made the comments Monday testifying before Australia's federal inquiry into allegations of child sex abuse in state and religious institutions. Next week he takes up his new job as prefect of the Vatican's Secretariat of the Economy, Pope Francis' new finance ministry.
Pell said the Australian church by 1995 was far ahead of the Vatican in dealing with abuse: "The attitude of some people in the Vatican was that if accusations were being made against priests, they were made exclusively or at least predominantly by enemies of the church to make trouble."
Full story: How the church concealed Father Ridsdale's crimes .. video insert from yours ..
--- THE LIES OF GEORGE PELL: Loss of Faith - 60 minutes
the article below is very long .. very sordid .. it cements Pell as a willow tree liar (apology to the willow, a beautiful and very fun giving tree, we swung on them for hours as kids), as that video from yours dealing with Ridsdale did .. it blows in the wind, too ---
By a Broken Rites researcher (updated 13 April 2014)
This Broken Rites article is the most comprehensive account available about how the Catholic Church harboured this child-abuser - Father Gerald Francis Ridsdale - for 30 years while his superiors and fellow-priests remained silent to protect the church's public image. Gradually some of his victims (encouraged by Broken Rites and other investigators) have spoken to detectives in the Victoria Police child-protection squad. Ridsdale, who is serving a 20-year sentence, was in court again in 2014 because some additional victims have recently come forward. He pleaded guilty to these additional charges and on 8 April 2014 some more years were added to his exising jail sentence. In his four trials since 1993, Ridsdale has been jailed for assaulting a total of 54 children but these were not his only victims; many other victims of his have not yet contacted the detectives.
This photo helped to expose the cover-up
Broken Rites believes that this photo (below) raises two questions:
1. WHY did Bishop George Pell accompany Father Gerald Ridsdale to court on 27 May 1993 when Ridsdale received his first conviction for child-sex crimes?
2. WHY did no bishop, or even a priest, accompany the victims?
Father Ridsdale (with his features obscured by dark glasses and a cap) walked to the Melbourne Magistrates Court with his support person, Bishop Pell (wearing clerical garb). Unknown to Ridsdale and Pell, one of Ridsdale's victims had alerted the media about the court case. Therefore, when the priest and the bishop reached the court building, a Channel Nine camera man obained video footage of their arrival.
[...]
David Ridsdale and George Pell
Early in February 1993, when he was 25, David was considering reporting Gerry Ridsdale to the police. David says he consulted family friend George Pell, who by then had become an auxiliary bishop in Melbourne. There is some dispute about who said what during this alleged conversation. David later claimed (in an interview published in "Outrage" magazine in April 1997) that Pell encouraged David to remain silent about the abuse but Pell denies doing this.
After this conversation with Pell, David decided that he would not be able to obtain justice through the church.
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