Cardinal George Pell says a number of complaints of clergy abuse of children were wrongly dismissed.

"I don't have the statistics on that but too many of them certainly were dismissed and sometimes they were dismissed in absolutely scandalous circumstances," Cardinal Pell told the child abuse royal commission via videolink from Rome.

He said the tendency to dismiss complaints was more about protecting the church.

"At that stage, the instinct was more to protect the institution, the community of the church, from shame," he said.

"I'm not sure at that stage there was too much concern about protecting assets."