ROME
9 News
AAP
Cardinal George Pell believed an “effeminate” priest accused of abusing children a week after his ordination was sent overseas to study.
The cardinal has previously told the child abuse royal commission he always had reservations about Father Paul Ryan and was never supportive of his priestly vocation.
This was because Ryan had a “rather effeminate manner”, Dr Pell told the commission via audio visual link from Rome on Thursday.
Cardinal Pell shared his concerns about Ryan with other priests, but he could not recall who.
Ryan was sent to the US in 1977 and 1979.
In 2006, when he was 57, he was jailed after pleading guilty to assaulting an altar boy in his parish house.
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