ROME
Gazzetta del Sud
Rome, July 20 – An Australian cardinal leading efforts to clean up Vatican finances has courted controversy again – after a much-criticised stance on sex abuse – by chiding Pope Francis for his landmark encyclical on climate change. George Pell, who last year likened a typical victim of sex abuse to hitchhikers, and the Church to the truck they happened to have taken, told the Financial Times that the Church had “no particular expertise in science”. Pell told the Financial Times the church had “no particular expertise in science”. “The Church has got no mandate from the Lord to pronounce on scientific matters,” he said, adding “we believe in the autonomy of science.” Pell’s comments came a month after Francis released his historic encyclical, ‘Laudato si’, calling on humanity to fight global warming. …
Pell is a well-known climate change skeptic. He was appointed to reform the Vatican’s finances nearly 18 months ago. Last August Pell enraged survivors of clerical sex abuse by comparing the Vatican to a trucking company that could not be blamed if a driver molested a hitchhiker. Pell made the remark while testifying via videolink from Rome to an Australian probe into historic abuse and alleged cover-ups when he was Melbourne archbishop in the 1990s. Saying it would not be appropriate for legal culpability to be “foisted” on church leaders, he drew an analogy between the Catholic Church and a trucking company, citing a hypothetical example of a case involving a woman who was molested by a truck driver. “It would not be appropriate, because it’s contrary to the policy, for the ownership, leadership of that company to be held responsible,” Cardinal Pell said. “Similarly with the church and the head of any other organisation. “If every precaution has been taken, no warning has been given, it is, I think, not appropriate for legal culpability to be foisted on the authority figure. “If in fact the authority figure has been remiss through bad preparation [or] bad procedures or been warned and done nothing or [done something] insufficient, then certainly the church official would be responsible.” Nicky Davis from the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP) was in the audience of the royal commission during Cardinal Pell’s comments. She said the truck analogy left the audience “open mouthed in shock”.
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