AUSTRALIA
ABC – The Drum
OPINION
By Noel Debien
Understanding the terminology used by the church, how its factions work, and the processes they have in place will help you make sense of Cardinal George Pell’s testimony to the child abuse royal commission this week, writes Noel Debien.
Watching the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse can be frustrating.
Over the last week, establishing when Cardinal George Pell actually knew about paedophile offences committed by Gerald Ridsdale involves going back to the mentality and the language of the 1980s. In particular to the language and mentality of the Catholic church. And it helps to understand the factionalism of the Church and how the so-called anti-Catholic “culture wars” further complicated the issue.
The terminology
Though the Cardinal testified it was 1972 when he first heard about clergy sex abuse in the Mildura parish, he firmly denied he knew about it (as a consultor) in regard to Gerald Ridsdale at the time.
Cardinal Pell testified “paedophilia” was not discussed with him in regard to Ridsdale. At least, not by anyone in time to prevent the damage.
Paedophilia would have been an odd word to be throwing around in the 1970s and ’80s. It wasn’t used in ordinary conversation, and certainly not in Catholic households. Ballarat ex-Bishop Mulkearns’ testimony concerning the criminal Paul David Ryan showed he was having Ryan treated for “homosexuality”. Mulkearns admitted he knew Ryan was offending against boys.
“Interfering with kids” has been another term used in testimony. I do not for a moment wish to confuse same-sex attraction with paedophilia, but I do want to point out there is a serious disconnect that arises from this differing language.
Church v state
Royal Commission hearings expose a very real confusion between the places and roles of religion, psychiatry and law, sexual orientation, gender, sin, crime, virtue, prayer, canon law and the police during the 1980s. And all this went into the Ballarat 1980s mixmaster.
The Australian church of the 1980s was wary of the state. Its seminaries and schools reminded Catholic students of historic state persecution, and British anti-Catholic penal laws that operated in early Australia.
And after the 1970s, the so-called Catholic “culture wars” added further complication.
There were (and are) progressive and conservative factions among Australia’s bishops, priests and people.
Cardinal Pell has testified his fellow clergy, like Bishop Mulkearns and Archbishop Frank Little, deceived him or lied to him over many sexual abuse matters.
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