AUSTRALIA
BRW
Darren Hill
I don’t know whether you shared the same response as I did when I read this article regarding recent responses by the Catholic Church at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses into Child Sexual Abuse.
My initial reaction was one of slack-jawed disbelief. I was speechless. Then I got angry. I then did what most opinionated buggers like me do—I took to social media to exercise my righteous indignation. Bam.
Rather than simply rant to our friends and family on Facebook and the like, perhaps we should take a closer look into what essentially is a public display of leadership; or more specifically, what NOT to do as a leader of an organisation facing turmoil.
It is in fact, a case study of the reactions of a senior leader of arguably the most powerful organisation on the planet. And quite simply, George Pell demonstrated—in a very public fashion—exactly why the Catholic Church continues to lose relevance.
Half a century ago, 70 per cent of Catholics were attending mass, but that has now dropped and is approaching single figures. The recent lack of humanity shown by Pell in his comments via weblink in the Royal Commission has highlighted the lack of touch the management of this organisation displays towards its flock.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.