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	Australian Cardinal May Hold New Abuse Probe As Pope Visits By Ed Johnson Bloomberg July 10, 2008 http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601081&sid=aS8dUdWx26gY&refer=australia July 10 (Bloomberg) -- The leader of the Catholic Church in Australia said he will consider a fresh inquiry into a sex abuse case involving a priest more than 20 years ago, days before Pope Benedict XVI visits Sydney for World Youth Day. Cardinal George Pell told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. he would "take legal advice" on holding a new church investigation after learning the priest admitted forcing himself on a 29-year-old man in 1982. Pell acknowledged sex abuse scandals had damaged the church and said he was disappointed the case had resurfaced before the pontiff's visit. "We would like it otherwise but in life you have to cope with what comes," he told the ABC's "The 7:30 Report" program, according to a transcript. The 81-year-old pope, who arrives in Australia at the weekend, is facing demands to apologize to victims of sexual abuse by the Catholic clergy. Australian support group Broken Rites says it has been contacted by more than 3,500 people in the past two decades complaining of abuse by priests. It wants the pope to meet with victims during his weeklong visit. More than 125,000 pilgrims from overseas will attend the five-day World Youth Day celebrations, which culminate in an open-air mass on July 20 to be attended by 500,000 people. Organizers are billing the festival as the biggest event Australia has hosted and say it will draw more people to Sydney than the 2000 Olympic Games. Abuse Scandal The abuse scandal dominated headlines earlier this week when the ABC's "Lateline" program interviewed the victim of the assault, who said Pell misled him about the initial church probe. In a news conference two days ago, Pell acknowledged he had made a mistake when he informed the victim by letter in 2003 that an internal inquiry hadn't upheld the complaint of sexual assault. The investigator had accepted the victim's allegations. Pell also acknowledged he was wrong to state that there were no other complaints against the priest. He had signed a letter the same day upholding a complaint of indecent assault against an altar boy. "There was no cover-up," Pell told the ABC yesterday. "The matters were followed through to the conclusion, the priest was stood down and the letter that I signed was badly written and that's my mistake." Pell said the priest had always maintained that his sexual encounter with the man, a church education coordinator with whom he had been swimming that day, had been consensual. Phone Tap During the interview, the ABC informed the cardinal of a police phone tap recording made in 2003 in which the priest acknowledged it wasn't consensual and that he'd taken advantage of the victim. That may warrant a fresh inquiry, said Pell, who pioneered church protocols in Australia in the 1990s to deal with sexual abuse by the clergy. The pope addressed the issue of sex abuse during a visit to the U.S. in April and called on the church to "foster healing and reconciliation." Some American Catholics have criticized what they say is the Vatican's reluctance to confront child abuse. "The scandals of the church are well known. They've damaged us," Pell told the ABC. "It's a problem, I certainly hope the pope apologizes." About 26 percent of Australia's 21.3 million people described themselves as Catholic in the most recent census, carried out in 2001, according to the government's Bureau of Statistics. To contact the reporter on this story: Ed Johnson in Sydney at ejohnson28@bloomberg.net
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