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Archbishop charged with concealing sex abuse quits royal commission body
By Helen Davidson
The Archbishop of Adelaide, charged on Tuesday over the alleged cover up of child sexual abuse by a fellow priest, has stepped down from his role in a supervisory group that deals with the royal commission. Victims’ advocates have welcomed the charge, but labelled the church’s response to it “arrogant.” NSW police charged the archbishop, Philip Wilson, and issued a court attendance notice over allegations he concealed knowledge about child sexual abuse committed by a fellow priest, Jim Fletcher, in the 1970s, when the pair worked together in the Hunter region. He is the highest-ranking church official in the world to be charged with such a crime. Wilson denies any wrongdoing and released a statement saying he would defend the charge. Nicky Davis, head of the international advocacy group Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests said that for survivors of abuse the news was “as big as the announcement of the royal commission”. “This is what we’ve been waiting for,” she told Guardian Australia. On Tuesday Wilson stepped down from his role on a supervisory group linked to the Truth Justice and Healing Council, which co-ordinates the church’s dealings with the royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse. He said he had taken leave from his post as archbishop “in order to consult with a wide range of people in response to the information I have received”. He has also taken leave from his position as vice-president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference (Acba). Before 2012 Wilson served three terms as its president, one of the highest Catholic church positions in the country. Davis said the church’s response was “arrogant”. She said it would not achieve much if Wilson resigned, but not doing so “shows very clearly how seriously the church takes this, and that is not very seriously at all”. “It shows just how unimportant they consider survivors and how little relevance they feel that sort of criminal activity has to moral behaviour, that it’s acceptable behaviour,” she said. Davis pointed to the case of Robert Finn - the only US bishop to be convicted of concealing abuse - who was given a two-year suspended sentence in 2012. Despite calls for him to be removed as a bishop he remains in the post. The Vatican initiated an investigation into Finn’s tenure in September at the request of Pope Francis. The president of Acba and archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, released a statement urging people “not to make any judgment until the charge against archbishop Wilson has been dealt with by the court”. Wilson’s successor as bishop of Wollongong in NSW, Peter Ingham, said he was “saddened” to hear of the charge. Fletcher’s crimes were among those examined by a NSW special commission of inquiry into the handling of abuse allegations in the Newcastle-Maitland region. Fletcher died in 2006 while serving a jail sentence for the rape of a 13-year-old boy over the years 1989 to 1991. In his statement on Tuesday, Wilson vowed to “vigorously defend” his innocence. He said he was “disappointed” the charge had been brought, and said he had “pioneered” best practice child protection measures since becoming a bishop. Wilson was ordained as a bishop in 1996, when he was appointed to the Wollongong diocese. In Wollongong Wilson was heavily involved in responding to multiple allegations of abuse by a priest, John Nestor. The response to Nestor’s actions were examined by the royal commission last year, at which Wilson was a witness. The royal commission found actions by other priests undermined Wilson’s efforts to protect children from further abuse by Nestor.
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