From the moral and ethical point of view Cardinal
Pell must now either resign or the Pope must retire
him. If its not done, the Church will pay heavily
in the loss of its membership. Cardinal Pell was
more than just a parish priest. His responsibility
was the equivalent of a Director of a Corporation.
He placed his own ambition above that of the well being
of the members of his Church:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-02/humphreys-george-pell-and-the-power-of-indifference/7213120

What about the BBC?

Why haven't heads been rolling there?

Interesting and predictable that the focus in some quarters is on Pell, but others are somehow treated with kid gloves?

In politics too, the ministers have escaped Scot free. Why so?

Politicians like Willie Shorten (and others from both sides) are always quick to duck everything but the power, pay and privileges of position, saying that it is only where they are actually convicted by a court that it matters, but even then they wriggle out.

My concern and it has been expressed consistently on OLO, is that leaders must be held responsible for what happens under their watch. Usually they OUGHT to have known and were not fulfilling their responsibilities somewhere.

For example, what is there about the management of the BBC (or unions in Australia) that complainants did not feel they could come forward an use the internal complaint mechanisms (if in existence!) or that if they did, they themselves might (read as would) suffer?

The red flag is always up where ministers and leaders are shirking their fiduciary responsibilities and do not have adequate, proactive controls in place, with a program of independent reviews.

I doubt that Pell will be retired or resign Foxy. That would be seen as an admission of guilt and the church doesn't want to pay out any more compensation from the huge amount of wealth they have accumulated from the faithful (gullible) over the years.

Mind you, this 'serious heart problem' that supposedly precludes Pell from sitting in a first class seat in a plane flying back to Australia, may well be handy in keeping him from having to face more abuse victims in Australia.

He did look well to me when he forcefully proclaimed his ignorance on anything happening to kids in all the places he worked earlier in his 'career'. Not that I am suggesting he would lie about the seriousness of any heart problems, because priests don't sin like that...

Dear Foxy,

I think the Australian government should commission Pell to write a history of the Catholic Church in Australia. If Tony Abbott was still the PM (which he might be after the next election, i.e. the LNP dumps an elected Turnbull, putting Abbott back into the top job - I can just see Abbott saying 'Thanks Turnie for winning the election for me") I'm sure he would commission Pell to perform that task. Plus he might even give him one of those free fake $40K Rolexes as a sign of appreciation.

Foxy,

I think Pell is a gutless, lying enabler...however, we need to take into account that it is Canon Law not to boot out paedophiles.

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/2340393/opinion-pontifical-secret-allows-abuse-to-go-unpunished/

" The policy of secrecy may not have been so disastrous for children had canon law’s internal disciplinary procedures been adequate to dismiss such priests. But they were not.

Canon law required bishops to try and reform such priests before dismissing them. In his 1983 Code of Canon Law, Pope John Paul II imposed a five-year limitation period that effectively meant there would be no canonical trials of sex-abusing priests.

It also gave such priests a Catch-22 defence: a priest cannot be dismissed for paedophilia because he is a paedophile.

The more children a priest abused, the less likely it was could he be dismissed."

"In 1962, Pope St. John XXIII reissued Crimen Sollicitationis. In 1974, Pope Paul VI, by his decree, Secreta Continere renamed ‘‘the secret of the Holy Office’’ ‘‘the pontifical secret’’, and it continued to apply to the sexual abuse of children under the new 1983 Code of Canon Law.

In 2001, Pope St. John Paul II confirmed the pontifical secret under some new procedures, and in 2010, Pope Benedict XVI expanded its reach by applying it to allegations of priests having sex with intellectually disabled people. In 2010, the Holy See allowed a restricted form of reporting to the civil authorities but only where the civil law required it."

"But now there is hard evidence that six popes since 1922, two of them now saints, maintained and expanded a system of cover-up of child sexual abuse by clergy through canon law, in order to save the Church’s reputation.

These were not “bad popes” of the Renaissance kind.

An unintended consequence of this policy was an increase in damage done to children, a crime that the Church’s founder thought was so bad that those responsible should be thrown in the sea with millstones around their necks."

(More in article)

Personally I have no idea what level of crime that Pell partook or turned a blind eye to. What I do know is that numerous bosses at the bbc turned a blind eye to Saville and that numerous turned blind eyes to Islamic child abuse in England and Australia and that rates of abuse among Indigenous is at epidemic rates. Can't help but to think many haters of Pell are not concerned about victims nearly as much as hating the Catholic church probably because it does not line up with their worldview. Personally I have no time for the Catholic church after being brought up in it but am somewhat puzzled by the irrational hatred towards Pell as most don't really know what he did and did not do. No one on this forum would be able to accurately answer questions of what took place up to 50 years ago