This Priest might get a rap on the knuckles.
Cardinal George Pell Judgement
Earlier this morning Cardinal George Pell was freed from prison. This might be an enormous relief to the man himself, although life on the outside will not be simple. There will be church goers who will feel vindicated. I don’t share their relief.
The High Court’s decision is already seeming to be deeply hurtful for many people. Abused now-adult children and their parents will have wanted him guilty. The twitterverse wanted him guilty. George’s growing number of accusers will have wanted him guilty.
I have confidence in Australia’s justice system. That a man can go from guilty to two thirds guilty to not guilty at all befuddles me, but there are checks and balances. I can only assume that the people entrusted with sitting on the bench of the High Court are the wisest of heads. All respect to those women and men.
What of those who are left behind by this morning’s decision? I like this from Louise Milligan today: “Decent Australians will think with kindness today of vulnerable men who were brave.” Yes, we will think with kindness and we will commit that this will not happen to their children and grandchildren.
My concern is less about what happens to Catholic clergy in the courts and more with what happens for the thousands of people we broke. We broke them because we thought that illegal rape was only immoral. We broke them because we were immature in so many ways, and then were vested with a dysfunctionally isolated authority. Nobody questioned the priests.
This, from “Spotlight,” the 2015 Boston church abuse movie: “If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse one." Thousands and thousands of children were raped because a catastrophic failure of culture and leadership allowed and even fostered it to happen. The men at all levels of Church leadership were (are) those least likely to be relationally mature. I recall a priest in a neighbouring parish not coming for dinner because there would be two women (teachers from school) at the table. Nobody ever questioned that dysfunction. How could he run a parish?
So, yes, decent Australians will think with kindness today. We will be aghast that kindness didn’t dwell where it should have. We will stand beside every person (a lot of women do this in their own search for justice) who accuses truthfully but without evidence.
Fr Andrew Hayes
Parish Priest
St Mary’s Ararat and St Patrick’s Stawell