AUSTRALIA
The Age
November 23, 2012
Barney Zwartz
CARDINAL George Pell showed a ”sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and response of the Catholic hierarchy” to parents whose young daughters were repeatedly raped by a priest, the Victorian inquiry into how the churches handled child sex abuse has been told.
Anthony Foster told on Friday how they met the cardinal – now Archbishop of Sydney – when he was Melbourne archbishop, in a furniture storage room at a Melbourne presbytery. They were squeezed onto a narrow wooden bench, while he sat in a ”grandiose” padded leather chair.
“In our interactions with the now-Cardinal Archbishop Pell, we experienced a sociopathic lack of empathy, typifying the attitude and responses of the church hierarchy.”
He expressed no emotion when shown a picture of the Fosters’ daughter Emma harming herself – she later killed herself – and said expressionlessly: ”Hmmm, she’s changed, hasn’t she?”
”What sort of of people did he mix with, what sort of life did he lead, that he thought this comment was appropriate?” Mr Foster asked.
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