Mr Jones has been trying to get justice for years and his advisers have been pretty smart in getting Pell to sit up and take notice - at last - when it was getting too embarrassing to ignore.

You could ask a variation on your question: Why has it taken so long for Cardinal Pell to take an interest in this matter and why has he suddenly announced a review of the case at this particular time?

Could it be that he has been expecting it to just go away? That he didn't intend to listen to Mr Jones - and that it was only when the pressure of the Pope's visit became unbearable that he was forced to respond?

Cynicism is possible on both sides.

I do not know more about the case than what is in the article

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/sex-abuse-coverup/2008/07/07/1215282750977.html.

However, if one wants to speculate, quite a few questions can be asked.

There is no mention of rape or even buggery (only attempted), only "indecent assault" that the (secular) court punished with a sentence of four seconds. There is no mention of the physical conditions of those involved, whether the 29 years old victim could not have defended himself. Obviously, what happened should not have happened, but to say, as the victim does, that "the apology that the Pope may give [to church abuse victims] has no meaning if the Archbishop of Sydney is still covering up sexual assaults," thus comparing his case with what happened to many children in the USA and elsewhere (a comparison I personally find disrespectful of these victims), to whom the Pope's apologies have been addressed, makes one ask another speculative question. Namely, whether Mr. Jones had known that the unfortunate Father Goodall assaulted also a nine year old boy (which must have been a crime deserving more than a four second sentence) so he was vulnerable and ... well, the speculation must stop here, since there is no mention of compensation in the article. Another speculative question: did not Pell err only in not paying enough attention to what turned out to be a "four second crime" when occupied with much more serious misdeeds by the same priest that he had proofs of?

Well, from what is in the article, I do not think that "the pressure of the Pope's visit became unbearable" just because of this cover up of "a four second crime": the poor Pope had to get used to news of much more serious sexual crimes and cover ups in the US, and perhaps also in Australia.

Oliver,

"
- Should we pull Pells' passports pending police investigations?
- Should the Pope protect these guys?"

The first part has been covered by Foxy - I agree that police investigations probably won't get anywhere.

As to the Pope, of course he shouldn't put up with this situation for a second. While he has apparently [only] said this is his view, the practices of the Church are still lagging far behind. What the Pope should do is make it clear to all his clergy that none of them will get promoted into the Church hierarchy until they back up their piousness with Christian actions. That is, they need to do more than just pontificate about their faith - they need to practice it so that the whole world can see exactly what they believe and what they are about.

Broken rites says

If a victim is not satisfied with the amount of compensation offered through the *Towards Healing* process (or through the Melbourne diocese process), he/she can reject the offer and then *launch a civil action through solicitors*, seeking damages from the particular diocese or religious order which inflicted the offender on the victims.

yes indeed, I was hearing the tiny patter of lawyers feet back on page 3 of this thread

Anything to do with Professor Parkinson simply means more billions to lawyers as we found out in Family Law

so I will just say no thanks Mr Slater/Gorden etc and catch you all later in another thread

RobP and Foxy,

Defiance of the Pope is not unknown to history. Innocent III demanded Frederick II [Germany, Sily & Italy] kill and torture his people. Fortunately, Fred [who ironically was a ward of Innocent from the age of four] did not. He sided with rightful behaviour, rather than the excesses of the Church. The secular won out.

If memory serves, it was the same Innocent III, who invalidated the Magna Carta, which amongst other things stated, “To no one will we sell, to no one will we deny or delay right or justice”.

Alternatively, Friar Francis of Assissi lived a life of caring for his fellow humankind. I wonder what St Francis would make of the Pell, the past Bishop of Boston and their ilk?

Pell is no a policeman and Pell is not a jury and Pell is not a secular judge.

Of course, you are correct. Complementing the heircharchical structures in society are horizontal peer structures, where those at top look after each other's interests

Spikey,

“ Thank you for the additional forensic detail. And your point is...?”

The reporter made a false innuendo against Pell and the supporting evidence is fabricated or grossly misleading. Making false innuendos that Pell covers up paedophilia or anything remotely similar may make Pell even more unpopular but it should be exposed for what it is.

” Defence of Ridsdale?”
No

” … Pell?”
Yes

” … Church's handling of sexual abuse and exploitation of position?”
Read my other posts.

” Defence of the status quo and deflection from possible means of preventing abuse in the future?”

No and if the status quo wasn’t dynamic we’d still have as much abuse as we did in the 80s. People might not like Pell’s views on abortion etc. but he is certainly a clever, strong leader not wishy washy like most Bishops including those in charge in the 60s to 80s when abuse peaked. It is therefore not surprising that he was capable of producing a programme that the clergy victim support group considers to be superior for victims than that produced by other Bishops throughout Australia. If preventing abuse (or, more realistically, minimizing it) is a priority (cf. pro-abortion issues) he would be the most logical candidate to take the lead.

” I'm trying to represent the interests of the victims. Whose interests are you representing?”
Martin Luther King once said words to the effect that you can’t achieve good ends through evil means because the means and the seeds and the ends are the tree. False information that makes Pell looks like he is lieing about sex offenders will not promote any positive interest.

George,

“All I wanted was to point to the other side of the story in case somebody following this thread was interested.“

I am a Catholic so I’m not completely hostile toward the Church. I stand by my comments while recognizing that it is a media beat up to make Pell look bad at an effective time and the paedophilia thing is misrepresented in the media.