Some A$110,000 has been raised to send child sexual abuse survivors to Rome to witness Cardinal George Pell’s latest royal commission testimony. Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has agreed to let Cardinal Pell testify through a video link. This was after it accepted the cardinal’s health meant he could not Read more
Cardinal George Pell will give evidence to a child sex abuse inquiry in Australia through video link from Rome later this month. In a ruling released on Monday, the head of Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, Justice Peter McClellan, accepted medical evidence of a risk to the cardinal’s health if he undertook Read more
Cardinal George Pell looked “ashen and grey” last month, according to a priest testifying at an Australia inquiry into child sex abuse. Fr John Walshe told a royal commission hearing about a lunch at Cardinal Pell’s apartment in Rome in November. “I couldn’t get over how poorly he looked when I saw him last month,” Read more
A health issue means Cardinal George Pell will not go to Australia this month to testify in person before a royal commission into child sex abuse. The cardinal, currently based at the Vatican, had been scheduled to appear before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse in Melbourne on December 16. But Cardinal Read more
An Australian priest broke the seal of Confession to warn a fellow paedophile priest about an altar boy’s abuse complaint. On Monday, during hearings in Melbourne, Australia’s Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse heard from the victim about the 1968 incident. In the confessional, “BTU” told Fr Wilfred Baker that Fr Ronald Read more
Lawyers for Cardinal George Pell will cross-examine victims who allege he was complicit in a cover-up of clergy sexual abuse. The move comes despite a commitment by the Australian Catholic Church not to subject victims of child sexual abuse to gruelling cross-examination. Cardinal Pell denies the allegations against him concerning the period when he was Read more
The Church’s Melbourne Response for helping abuse survivors discouraged victims from contacting police, a royal commission case study has found. Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse issued a case study this week into the programme instituted by then-Archbishop George Pell in 1996. The study identified 12 systemic issues. One issue was Read more
A retired bishop has said Cardinal George Pell destroyed the unity of the Australian Church’s response to child sex abuse. Bishop Geoffrey Robinson said this during testimony to the Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Sydney on Monday. Bishop Robinson worked with other bishops on an Australia-wide clergy response to abuse, Read more
Abuse survivors from Ballarat are outraged that Cardinal George Pell will appear before a royal commission in Melbourne, not in their city. Cardinal Pell had been due to give evidence to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse at the second stage of the Ballarat hearings in November. However, last week the Read more
The Catholic Church’s insurance company in Australia has been given until July 17 to produce almost 2000 files relating to child abuse. On July, 10, Australia’s Royal Commission on Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse ordered Catholic Church Insurance (CCI) to produce the files. CCI was ordered to provide a list of relevant material by Read more