Irfan Yusuf has the money quote on all the World Youth Day imbroglios, writing in today’s New Matilda:
I guess it really boils down to values. Cardinal Pell once accused Muslims of having difficulty separating Church from State. Unless he openly distances himself from (and not just denies involvement in) increased police powers designed to protect pilgrims from annoyance, his own secular credentials might look compromised.
On Lateline last night, in the context of new revelations about the crimes of Father Terrence Goodall, and George Pell’s casuistry in dealing with clergy abuse victim Anthony Jones, and his avoidance of any admission of culpability and therefore responsibility for the consequences of his actions, host Tony Jones interviewed prominent Catholic journalist and author Robert Blair Kaiser.
And I think that model can be applied to modern times and we can be a much more responsible, accountable church in a local situation where the bishop is not appointed by the Pope but elected by the people.
In referring to the democratising forces unleashed by Vatican II, Kaiser was suggesting that the root cause - not just of clergy abuse but also of cover-ups and grossly inadequate responses to its “horror” - is a deeply authoritarian tradition and its accompanying mindset and culture. George Pell is one of the leading lights of the Catholic “restorationists” who want to put all the genies of Vatican II back in the bottle, and return to a “Father Knows Best” model which has given us Catholics a Church marred and contaminated by misogyny and authoritarianism. Pell’s attitude to political power (which has been on show with World Youth Day) and his treatment of those whom some priests and brothers have monstered is cut from the same cloth - a desire to protect the institution and its power above all else. Jones also interviewed Canberra lawyer Jason Parkinson, who told of the enormous lengths the Church will go to to escape any legal responsibility in the civil courts. Pell and his confreres want victims to accept the Church’s own structures - which allegedly promote “healing” but which actually reinforce the power of Bishops at the expense of justice. As both Kaiser and Parkinson argued, an apology from the Pope - or from Pell - is really beside the point if the hierarchy continue to act as if the Church were a self-contained universe where fundamental civil and human rights do not exist.
The WYD delegates are cramming Melbourne’s airport and trains as well.
I am trying hard to resist the urge to redirect groups of them on day trips to Crown Casino via King Street and St. Kilda. But, I fear, not hard enough, if they hang around much longer…
“as if the Church were a self-contained universe where fundamental civil and human rights do not exist.”
Agree whole-heartedly Mark. The same can be said for organised religion in all its guises - whether catholic, protestant, muslim, jew or whatever.
There are fundamental civil and human rights that transcend all religious (and indeed political) systems. It’s a shame that most religions don’t recognise that. Catholics are one of the worst offending groups - right up there with Islam really.
Separation of Church and State also implies that if a civil offence appears to have been committed, say rape or molestation, then Mr & Mrs Plod should be called in to investigate and then it’s up to the Plods to recommend civil prosecutions. Do corporations hide rapists? Do State schools? Well, footy clubs maybe, I’ll grant that.
Although it is worth noting that in many ways Pell is more a creature of the Australian right-wing establishment than of the Churches authoriatiran side. The Church has been talking about Global Warming since before the recent buzz. They could certainly do more, but they have generally been a force for action (if you leave out contraception).
Pell, on the other hand, recycles every lie Bolt, Blair and Albrechtson spit out.
More broadly on social justice I think he’s also out of step with even many of the conservatives within the Church hierachy, including the Pope himself.
Mark: on a more serious point, as an outsider looking in it seems to me that however you feel about the tenets of religion itself, the organizational structure is so fundamentally screwed that there is essentially no way to achieve reform, unless you get lucky and a reformist Pope somehow hides those tendancies for 50 years as he makes his way through the organization.
That’s not impossible, Robert!
I wonder if Pell and Mosley have any friends in common…
I wonder if Pell and Mosley have any friends in common…
Which one? Kinky Max, or Blackshirt Oswald?
No. I’m not going to bother. Both the medieval inquisatorial George Pell and this Pope I know nothing about and care even less about are irrelevant to me.
Pell sometimes recognises a truce between state authority and the Catholic Church. He never concedes the primacy of the state in relation to the Catholic Church, its property and its office holders.
Pell accepts the authority of the state only insofar as that authority is consonant with Pell’s perception of the interests of the Catholic Church.
Thus, Pell could support terrorism if he perceived terrorism to be in the interests of the Catholic Church.
I listened to the Religion Report on ABC Radio National this morning. http://www.abc.net.au/rn/religionreport/default.htm All this talk of pious practices including the veneration of saintly relics, individual confession, the Latin Mass, eucharistic adoration and the stations of the cross, takes me back to my youth. One Saturday night in a Church in our small town in country Gippsland, before I turned 17 about 45 years ago, I knelt in the confessional, told the priest I did not believe in God, I would not confess to him because he was just a man, and I was only there because my mother forced. That was the last time my mother, a Catholic convert, forced me into church.
To hear the uncritical discussion on RN of these quaint old superstitions makes me wonder about whether any enlightenment or consciouness is ever secure and that we need continious struggle to keep this ignorance at bay. Time for the Rationalist Society to rise again as they did in the 1960s and enter the Universities to offer an alternative to the god bothers that have taken over.
Just Curious noticed the total silence from the Right press Blair,Ackerman Bolt and yet the same lot screamed long and loud about The Photos and the latset one in the Arts mag.
I dont recall a peep out of them,anything emerged from Hetty yet either
“That’s not impossible, Robert!”
Yer, but then they only last 33 days.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_I
Nana Levu,
you’re a Gippslander! By birth? I’m only a Gippslander by immigration: have only been here for 28 years. Cheers.
R.M…. “unless you get lucky and a reformist Pope somehow hides those tendancies for 50 years as he makes his way through the organization.”
Mark: That’s not impossible, Robert!
Trouble is, John Paul 1 lasted only 33 days under suspicious circumstances ,Mark.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_I
Separation of church and state? The Vatican is a state. No Catholic really believes in that separation. The Vatican has an Army and operates foreign policy, which often supports (whether through silence or overtly) dictators. Asking a Cardinal to not be hypocritical when talking about the separation of church and state is ridiculous.
The Catholic church, beyond the level of it’s apparently enlightened and modern laity, is absolutely toxic.
There is no doubt in my mind about religious mysogony and its role in sexualising and commodifying, in fact instigating on a child from earliest times a certain kind of “feminisation” derived from a mix of factors including ignorance, sensuality, guilt, Mariolatry and narcissism.
To me, the prime example is peculiar example of Miranda Devine, with her conditioned flurries of cocquettish dishonesty,incessant self-presentation and toxic personal venom in lieue of honest communication and discourse.
Equally, of course, with the male socialisation process that cripples so many males. Look at the gooses who write columns for the Murdoch press.
And so culture continues to self-replicate on an obsolete mode based on power rather than cooperation, in pursuit of an unobtainable chimera , a state of permanent “becoming” hanging on perpetually delayed fulfillment, that would obviate the subjugationist model.
It’s instructive to appreciate just who “their most catholic majesties” have been prepared to pal around with in order spread the teachings of the chippy’s son from Narareth. Not accepting responsibility for the pesky pecadillos of a few hunded thousand sexually predatory priests matters not a cuss to Holy Mother Church’s Big Boys.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-KBKSl9Fuo
Just watched Pell being interviewed on 7.30 Report.
One does have to wonder when you hear that Jones and Fr Goodall had a candlelight dinner together then went night-time swimming. Then after the alleged assault, Jones ends up sitting on a bed wrapped in a towel, Goodall is also in the room with just a towel.
Surely an adult male sexually assaulted would not put himself into a situation like this with the same person an hour or two later.
Nana Levu. Steven Crittendon who hosts the ABC RN Religion Report is a real gem and I don’t believe it needed him to be critical of all that saintly mumbo jumbo that I also heard regarding WYD and ‘relics’. My guess is that most listeners, even objective catholics would recognise the medieval nonsense that was being broadcast. When he needs to be Crittendon can show great skill on air.
Ambigulous
Yes I am a Gippslander by birth. Both sides. Irish Catholic and Welsh Methodist stock. We lived among the ‘water drinkers’ in the dairy farming area of south west Gippsland. I got out many years ago. Long before you arrived.
You may have just been taken hook, line and sinker by the arch spinner, Rodney.
My suggestion: read the rest of the growing information and not just the throw away burley like, “candlelight dinner”.
Jones said on Lateline a couple of nights ago he was getting changed from swimmers into clothes when the priest entered the room. George Pell says there was a candlelight dinner. The priest has been caught admitting in phone taps the sex was not consensual. I believe the victim, not some-one whose whole raison d’etre is to protect the Chutch’s reputation.
The second part, Joe, the towel scenario is true as Jones himself told that part of the story the other night.
Yes, well, harumph, chortle, snigger, smirk…
.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
.
Ah that’s rich. Rich I tells ya.
Yes, Paul, would you have gone back to the priest’s house or wherever the second assault took place?
I would imagine most people would run a mile.
I’m not a Catholic so have no brief for the church (ANY religion for that matter) but I wasn’t comfortable with Jones’ story the other night: it just didn’t have a 100% ring of truth.
What’s missing in your analysis (among other things) is twofold, Rodney:
(1) Jones was a religion teacher and Goodall was a priest. The whole point Kaiser’s making - and he’s quite right to say it comes up again and again among the stories of abuse from clergy - is the exaggerated respect and trust given to priests by virtue of their “sacred character” (a key legimator of which is celibacy, by the way). The fact Goodall was 28 at the time is beside the point - it’s not as though abuse doesn’t happen to adults and particularly where there’s an imbalance in power and a relationship of apparent trust. Goodall would have been trading on the sense of almost awe in which devout Catholics tend to hold all priests.
(2) You’ve accepted an extremely and self-servingly selective portrayal of the events by Pell. Note the actual context from the first Lateline story:
I suggest you read all of it rather than rely on Pell’s word.
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2008/s2297016.htm
Well, if anything, this story’s bringing the rape apologists out into the open. Now all the rest of need to do is duck while the Think-about-it-for-more-than-a-second-police practice their cluestick-twirling. (please?)
Archbishop Pell’s actions have clearly been vindicated. Jones’ actions and his story look very suspicious indeed. The magistrate hearing the case had obviously concluded consent was given and effectively imposed no sentence. Put that together - as the magistrate must have done - with the claim for $3.5 million and an impartial person must have some doubt.
This will be a one day wonder. Pell’s explanation has killed the story.
Whatever you do, don’t let that Goodall guy get the lid off my coffin.
maxie at 30 - Magistrate? The case was heard in the District Court. Perhaps your comments might be more credible if you got the basic facts right. The prosecution asked that no conviction be recorded, but the judge recorded a conviction and commented on the impact Goodall’s crimes had on his victim:
http://brokenrites.alphalink.com.au/nletter/page108-goodall.html
Still only one side of the story, Mark. The $3.5m side.
So because solicitors make a claim in a civil court for substantial damages on his behalf, Rodney, Jones can’t be believed? Goodall pleaded guilty. He was convicted. Presumably the facts were stipulated in the Court. Pell’s nonsense about what charges were laid ignores the change in the law, as well as the fact that prosecutors would have dropped charges carrying more substantial penalties in return for a plea, as is usual. It would be relevant to know what Goodall was originally charged with, and all the evidence available suggests that Pell is being extremely selective and highly misleading in spinning the evidence to put himself in the best light possible.
No doubt we’ll know more when the tape where Goodall apparently agreed the act was non-consensual is played on Lateline tonight.
Rather than taking Pell’s word for any of this, I’d prefer to be able to read the judgement in Goodall’s case. There are excerpts in the link I’ve just provided, but it doesn’t appear to me that NSW district court judgements are available on the web. I imagine that some enterprising journo might inspect the court records, but if not, I’m happy to put in an FOI request rather than take Pell’s word.
People who are so concerned to minimise Goodall’s crimes need to take a good hard look at their motivations imho.
Not much to say really except this must be really hard if you are a devout Catholic. To my mind Pell would be better off not trying to minimise events (esp the simple fact of the conviction). That said, he probably feels like both he and his Church are being deliberately witch-hunted just prior to WYD, so he’s ueber defensive.
Mark - you’ll be able to get a transcript of the judge’s sentencing remarks if it’s the District Court. These will be on the public record but unpublished.
Thanks for that, SL.
I’ll also note that Goodall conceded on the tape of the conversation with Jones recorded by police that the act was not consensual and said that he’d apologised to Jones because he’d “forced” himself on him.
If they are real Catholics, Robert, they’ll need no redirecting.
Today Cardinal Pell was in the media, he had “forgotten” to discipline one clergy man that sexually attacked a other man..
re#30,
the poster “Maxie” claims Pell has been “vindicated”?
Ho-ho, noooh!( hope “Maxie” is watching Lateline just now, as they recite a phone call transcript between the priest and his victim! ).
Not after the 730 Report second stringer Ali Brown had finished with Pell.
Without so much as a hint of snideness or a raised eyebrow, the forensic dissection aided most of all by the pitiful Pell himself, left little over but a few strands of hair, skin and gristle apart from a huge puddle of metaphoric blood, for the cleaning staff to mop up when Auntie closes down later for the night.
Re the Sceptic claw lawyer- yes it is sad for a certain type of Hansonite type Catholic. But not for real ones like the priest writing in Fairfax last weegend who was appalled at the shallow “reconstructionist” ideology/theology behind this flavour of world youth day and not Paul Collins, who’s career as a Jesuit intellectual was ruined by Pell for daring to think for himself on cultural issues.
My bet is real Catholics will rejoice at the clean out of ideologues, machine-men and pervs, who have so damaged such a potentially useful pro human institution (”liberation theology and the late asssassinated Archbishop Romero, for example )that’s the real issue in the wake of the trivial “photogate”; the sort of thing that ultra-ist catholics used to drive real Christian concerns off the agenda.
Does not one of the commandments abjure folk from bearing “false witness”. I think Pell is “gone” by the strictures of his own religion, since goodness depends on far more than just “seen” sexual probity, when he persists with the notion that the sex involving victims of the priest in question was “consensual”.
Sorry guys, but the Catholic Church has far more important things on its plate than dealing with molesting priests. It has to tackle the terrible scourge of Eucharist Smuggling! According to the spokesdroid for the American Catholic League:
“However, if anything were to qualify as a hate crime, to us this seems like this might be it.”
Indeed.
Rodney, Mark is spot on about the exaggerated reverence devout Catholics feel towards priests. i grew up with such slobbering sickening garbage.
As to whether I would go backj to the presbytery - if all I had to wear was swimmers,and I wanted to get my clothes, yes.
re#39, did I call Ali Moore Ali Brown?
She deserves much better than that.
Sorry, Ali.
Pell’s responses on the 7.30 Report tonight were nothing like the hostile caricature given above. He faced each question squarely and gave measured, thoughful and unevasive replies. He acknowledged (once again) his mistake and indicated a preparedness to revisit the whole episode in the light of the phone taps. Only someone already disposed unfavorably and with a closed mind on the question could characterise him in the way previous ;posts have done. But it’s not necessary to make that point. They make it themselves.
Questions must be raised about the way the ABC has ‘managed’ this story. They’ve strung it out over three nights withholding information and attempting to entrap the Cardinal. Undoubtedly their behaviour here is part of an ongoing agenda designed to destroy Pell. They cannot be designated an impartial and unbiased news organoisation in their reporting on matters connected with Cardinal Pell specifically and the Catholic church more generally. Spin and selective reporting prevail. Criticisms have been made of the way the Church manages its response on this issue. The management of this story - most notably the failure to fully report the court proceedings - and the drip feed of important details over three days looks like a deliberate bid to ‘get’ Cardinal Pell. A hit, no less. Their trotting out of Paul Collins - a former priest with absolutely no credibility on matters connected with Cardinal Pell - dredged the bottom of an all too predictable barrel. Of course this has been going on for years, ever since Pell was appointed Archbishop in Melbourne. One has given up on expecting anything like fair reporting from the ABC on anything to do with orthodox Christianity. Their reporters are hopeless.
On a final note, how is it that these phone taps were not available before ? Presumably they were not admissable in court. But yes, let’s spring them on Pell - ‘Gotcha’. Sneaky, very sneaky. But when it comes to the Catholic church and her representatives all’s fair.
Maxie, if there was nothing factual in the tape recordings there would be no story.
The ABC is merely “journal of record”. Nothing invented; just what’s actually there.
If we can’t trust the Catholic institution and it needs reform, then that’s good current afairs journalism, for a healthier society. Or would you prefer more of the sleazy goings-on, harm to people deserving of better, and worst of all cold-blooded dishonesty that hallmarks the current mess and so dishonours the Catholic Church and discredits a possible positive participant in ongoing cultural discourse?
btw Maxie, your false witnessing of Paul Collins does you little credit.
Somebody correct me if I have this wrong, but didn’t the police phone tap happen three years ago? And didn’t Pell already know about them but “conveniently” forgot?
They were ‘available’ to the Church investigation. Careful wording, that. Makes it sound like the church is covering up which fits the tenor of the ABC reporting throughout. Nicely ambiguous. Did the investigator know of the tapes ? Not mentioned. We’ll know more tomorrow. Pell’s statement that he was ‘unaware’ (not ‘forgot’) of the tapes was the truth.
They would have been admissable but since Goodall gave a guilty plea, presumably having been made aware of the existence of the tapes, it would not have been necessary to introduce them as evidence.
Maxie
What evidence do you have that employees of the ABC had these transcripts before the beginning of this story cycle? Without that evidence your accusation is defamatory.
Without that evidence your anti-Catholic conspiracy theory is nothing but paranoia.
Your misrepresentation of the trial process, wherein a guilty plea obviates the requirement to produce evidence, demonstrates your own bad faith in this matter.
Do yourself a favour by absenting yourself from this discussion.
Vote 1 Gorbachev for Pope!
Careful, maxie, if you don’t abide by the groupthink agenda that the ruling comment-clique here at LP feeds on, you’ll be tarred, feathered or, even worse, lynched from the Story Bridge.
Getting the pervs out of the priesthood: that’s the clear challenge. No cover-ups. No “shifting-the-molesters-along-to-another-parish”. Call in Plod when it seems warranted. How is the Australian Catholic Church going, on these issues?
It’s not as if there’s been no publicity…. a GG departed because of unsatisfactory attitudes in the Anglican church. Complaints against other Churches, various orders of priest/teachers, trubble at orphanage, ….
So, are the Protestant churches now squeaky clean???
And if so, how are all the Primary and Secondary schools coming along? There’ve been a few prosecutions of pupil-fiddlers in Victoria [male AND female perpetrators].
just askin’
How is the Australian Catholic Church going, on these issues?
Pretty well, thanks to Pell. In the face of much noisy protest he pushed through a reform that excludes homosexuals as candidates for the seminary. This has always been the key to the problem and will help to ensure that the church will not be troubled in the future. This is to Pell’s great credit.
Makes you wonder why his coterie of favoured priests as Archbishop of Melbourne were known as the “Spice Girls”, doesn’t it?
And - for that matter - why so many women and girls have been abused by Catholic clergy.
maxie, most people are aware that there’s no link between homosexuality as a sexual preference and pedophilia or a propensity to abuse power.
Maxie aspires to be the Pelayo of the blogosphere.
Back on topic, I invoked the name of Mikhail Gorbachev in response to Robert Merkel’s question to Mark about the reformability of a huge organisation with a “fundamentally screwed” organisational structure. The reform of the at least equally screwed CPSU and Soviet Union was the result, not only of Gorbachev himself managing to retain fidelity to the original democratic and humanitarian principles of socialism whilst rising through the ranks of the CPSU, but other factors including:
* the presence of many others within the organisation who were also amenable to more or less substantive reform;
* fundamental dysfunction within the party, state and society which had reached a crisis point more or less coinciding with Grobachev emerging as a candidate for party leadership;
* social visibility of the crisis to all but the most reactionary elements within the leadership of the party and state;
* external pressures which exacerbated the crisis and hastened the search for solutions.
To put Robert’s question once again to Mark, would you agree that something like this combination of conditions would need to exist in order to precipitate fundamental reform of the Church, and what specific developments at the present time in and around the Catholic Church would correspond to the developments in and around the CPSU which led to glasnost, perestroika and all that followed?
Rodney, try dealing with the issues raised, rather than your own particular brand of odious and ill founded paranoia.
maxie, care to answer Katz’s points, or do you prefer to ignore difficult pertinent questions, much like the church you seek to defend. And as Mark has pointed out, your linking of homosexuality with sexual abuse, merely displays your profound ignorance.
Yes, I think so, Paul, but those preconditions certainly aren’t there - at least in the Australian Catholic Church. Compare the response of lay people to the scandals over clergy abuse in America with the quiescence here. And from Pell’s point of view, World Youth Day is supposed to be a response to the crisis he perceives (lack of respect for authority, diminishing clergy numbers, erosion of tradition).
There were certainly major pressures for change building up in the global Catholic church in the 60s, 70s and 80s but JP2 managed to contain them by the imposition of Bishops who took a very hard line and who in many case were appointed over the objections and against the will of their national episcopal colleges. Where the analogy falls down is that the Catholic lay population aren’t akin to the citizens of a state - they have the option of walking away. As many have done. So, in a lot of right wing Catholic thought, you have the notion that a smaller Church isn’t a bad thing if it’s more “orthodox” - which is a notion fundamentally antithetical to the whole idea of Catholicity, let me hasten to add.
In other words, an attitude analogous to Lenin’s “better fewer, but better” and at odds with “go forth and make me disciples of all nations”.
“Saving remnant” is the term often used - got a big kick along with the publication in 1984 of a book called the Ratzinger Report. Fortunately, Benedict XVI is somewhat less conservative than Cardinal Ratzinger was!
“In the face of much noisy protest he pushed through a reform that excludes homosexuals as candidates for the seminary.”
Yer, right maxie, Pell has finally purchased a Gaydar.
This will save him from needing to defend priests who he reckons only engaged in consenting homosexual acts when such behaviour is also considered by him to be one of the most egregious sins against god.
Careful, maxie, if you don’t abide by the groupthink agenda that the ruling comment-clique here at LP feeds on, you’ll be tarred, feathered or, even worse, lynched from the Story Bridge.
Steady on, mate. The Story Bridge is a piss poor place to hang someone. What if the rope breaks and there’s a CityCat below? Someone could get hurt.
I don’t think the majority of comments are anti-Catholic, They are anti sexual abuse by priesta, whatever the particular priest’s sexual preference. Which is very different from being anti-Catholic.
I’ve said this before I think, but for those defending Cardinal Pell (who I actually feel a bit sorry for), sexual abuse by anyone, no matter who they are, ot what type of sexual abuse it is, is totally unacceptable.And Church authorities have an absolute responsibility to deal with it in a ay which is absolutely compassionate towards the victim, with no equivication or appearance of equivication. Its that appearance of equivocation that has got Pell in the mess he’s in.
And really, the days of anti-Catholic conspiracies went out with the introduction of Catholic emancipation in, I think, the 1830s.
Goodall refused to plead guilty to buggery. He told the church investigator that the episode was ‘more consensual than forced’. Jones had dined with Goodall and, wrapped only in a towel, was sitting in a bedroom with a man whose sexual intentions had been clearly indicated hours before. Pell’s conclusion of consensual sex was reasonable.
Why was the evidence of the phone taps not used to obtain a conviction on a more serious charge in 2005 ? Goodall does sound reluctant to concede he used force. He has to be prodded into using the words Mr Jones wants to hear and this might not stand up well in court.
Lateline and The 7.30 Report come out of this looking very shabby. Their charge that Pell had falsely claimed in a letter not to be aware that Goodall had other charges against him was in fact false. They implied Pell protected Goodall. Goodall was stood down and will not be allowed to continue his priestly duties. The claim of a cover up has been shown to be false. Sloppy, biased, malicious reporting. Gotcha indeed.
Maixe,
the only one’s looking ’shabby’ are Pell and those defending him, yourself included.
Mark - since you bring up the topic of pedophilia it should be said that this has never been the problem in the case of the Catholic clergy. I don’t have the statistics to hand but the overwhelming majority of cases involve homosexual (or bisexual) clergy and adolscent boys or young men. I’m not suggesting that there is any general link between homosexuality and sexual abuse. But in the cases where Catholic clergy have offended the link is clear. Of course, women and girls have been abused by heterosexual priests who break their vows too but this is more uncommon. To the extent that there has been a systemic failure in the Catholic church in the West, it originated in the screening of candidates for the priesthood. That has been tightened up here in Australia due to George Pell who faced down people such as yourself who could not see the problem.
Yeah, I’ve heard the Spice Girls quip before (yawn). You don’t seem to see the link between that and the mess the Church was in until Pell arrived.
Altar boys, Maxie?
Mark - since you bring up the topic of pedophilia it should be said that this has never been the problem in the case of the Catholic clergy.
Really?
GregM is correct, that evidence would have been part of the indictable brief of evidence served on the defence for Goodall, but with no obligation let alone desire for his legal representatives to make that available for public consumption.
Actually not defamatory Katz, since the unified defamation laws (or at least in NSW) makes it impossible for a corporation to sue unless it has less than 12 (from memory-could be wrong on the numbers) employees.
Mark re finding a transcript here’s a NSW District Court Website link:
http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/lawlink/caselaw/ll_caselaw.nsf/pages/cl_soa#district
Being 2005, there would not be an available transcript, however all proceedings in the District Court (as with Local Courts in NSW) are taped and kept in storage for the possibility of appeals. Given the interest in this case I imagine a request under FOI would give you a copy of the tape. Perhaps some enterprising media people might do this in the near future but it’s possible that a transcript might be the only way they would deal with that–ie the authorised section which does transcripts for appeals purposes.
In general the fact that Goodall appeared in the District Court indicates that he was charged with a seriously indictable offence such as sexual assault (ie rape)where there is no Table One or Table Two offence [per the Criminal Procedure Act 1986–Schedules 1 elections]capable of being proceeded with in a Local Court and accordingly ‘triable summarily’ in a Local Court.
It would appear that for a conviction of indecent assault in the District Court, there was therefore a plea bargain to that lesser charge. If OTOH the original charge was indecent assault it would normally have been dealt with in the Local Court UNLESS the DPP elected (Table 2, Schedule 1] to have it dealt with in the District Court. But I doubt the original charge was indecent assault, given the information at hand.
Sentencing would have likely considered criminal antecedents (assumed to be zero) hence (among other factors unknown) the 4 second custodial sentence.
Clear as mud, but hope it illuminates.
Why is that some people still insist that paedophilia and homosexuality go together?
I also think that this coming event should be called what it is WCYD. My husband noticed something interesting in footage the other night about WCYD with bunches of, not youthful, nuns and clergy.
And to Maxie, re
The systemic failure was in religious institutions, not only the Catholic church, condoning or turning a blind eye to abuse, particularly of children, and with many offenders in the past regarding sexual abuse of their charges as a perk of the job. The second evil, as we have seen in the last three or so decades, is the COVERUP.
Pell’s handling of the matter of Goodall, the spin, the explanations, the dissembling does not inspire confidence, to say the least.
(BTW one of my clients died before a physical (not sexual) abuse claim was ever submitted let alone substantiated with their in-house reconciliation program, but that non-Catholic institution in question paid the full amount of legal fees expended thus far as a gesture of good faith which impressed me mightily–I’m left to wonder now if the Catholic church would have equally responded, given the latest revelations of encouragement by the Catholic church for victims entering their program never to get legal advice.)
You can never hope to “screen them all out” maxie*. Question is, what does the organisation do when it receives a credible complaint?
* does a fiddler display his fiddle at interview? does a crook accountant ask questions about the potential for fraud at interview? Give these guys a bit of credit for deviousness, maxie.
I see Andrew Bolt is giving George Pell a big free pass on Q & A tonight.
But, Peter Kemp, perhaps you were not aware of this:
Paul Burns - Altar boys are minors but most cases involving altar boys would be seen as cases of same-sex attraction. Pedophilia has its own pathology of behaviours centred on young children. It has nothing to do with homosexuality as earlier posts reminded us. It’s important to make this distinction because homosexual priests have done immense damage to the church. I know, I know, heterosexual abuse occurs as well but it’s nowhere near as common. The starting point in cleaning up the stables has to be in how candidates for the priesthood are selected. George Pell has done a lot in this respect in recent years.
Maxie,
A Child is anyone under the age of consent. So far as I’m aware the age of consent is 16.
“The starting point in cleaning up the stables has to be in how candidates for the priesthood are selected.”
Perhaps starting by removing a restriction, originally imposed for base commercial reasons, on priests not being allowed to share with their flock one of the the most elemental, powerful and transcendental of earthly interactions. Y’know - fucking. You stifle a bloke of that and often more times than not he goes a liddle bit funny.
Y’know maxie, you wouldn’t have to spend so much of your time on damage control in the blogosphere if your superiors had only extended as much worldly forgiving empathy to their flocks as they do to eachother.
That’s right Katz, the individual in the corporation is protected by the defamation laws. A person within that corporation could sue while the separate corporate entity may not.
Well Maxie, I’ll respond to that with a black humour limerick, undoubtedly in bad taste, but which is suggestive of a connection between theism, pedophilia and homosexuality ever since young boys were marshalled together by Lucretia Borgia (who may have been sick of being bonked by priests?) and told to sing like angels in the choir.
“The starting point in cleaning up the stables has to be in how candidates for the priesthood are selected.”
Epic fail.
Whatever wonderful initiatives we have to prevent potential abusers getting into a position where they can abuse, it’s all fucking meaningless in the absence of a transparent, public and unequivocal means of dealing with offenders.
Harshly.
There once was a Cardinal Pell
Who covered up scandals so well
that all children catholic
ran from church so damn quick
to avoid their own personal hell.
” Altar boys are minors but most cases involving altar boys would be seen as cases of same-sex attraction.”
Maxie, what an ugly thing to say.
Alter boys are minors and there is no “but” about it. Adults who take sexual advantage of children are criminals. When they use a special position of power and awe to take advantage of children it is doubly criminal.
Joe2,
Hear, hear!
When I was a young fella getting my leg over, one thing you learnt from your peers (and you didn’t learn it from anyone else back then, especially if you were Catholic) was you didn’t have sex with anyone under 16. It was wrong, it was dangerous because you’d go to jail if you did, and if you went to jail you’d get a very hard time from the other crims. I don’t know if that message is still out there about rockspiders among young kids today, but I would hope it still is.
Mark wrote: “the Catholic lay population aren’t akin to the citizens of a state - they have the option of walking away. As many have done. So, in a lot of right wing Catholic thought, you have the notion that a smaller Church isn’t a bad thing if it’s more “orthodox” - which is a notion fundamentally antithetical to the whole idea of Catholicity”
It’s interesting how much ground the church lost from the 70s on - my family is probably fairly typical in that my mother (aged 87) is and will always be a church-goer, but none of her 5 children are. That older generation doesn’t walk away - they just, silently, know their own minds. They expected to be followers of the authority of the church, but in politics there was the DLP thing, and in law there was the abortion thing etc, so that they kept going to church, but they came to vote the opposite to how they were instructed.
What has saved the church from fading to nothing has been the schools - they’re in control of this vast empire of (mostly government funded) education. And in recent years, rather than be willing to shrink to a few faithful followers, they’ve used education as their big recruitment tool - they’ll take anybody (and expel the worst, to keep the ‘brand’ superior to those hellish state schools).
Pell, Hollingsworth, Hickey - along with people in senior positions in corporations, government etc - seem to fall into this power thing: their privileged positions come from the power/prestige of those institutions, and they won’t let the apple cart be upset by some ‘little’ person with a grubby story. They don’t ’see’ the person, they have to protect the institution. In my varied career I’ve had the novelty of being a public servant in both a fascist and a communist government, but I had no trouble understanding how they worked, twelve years at a Catholic school was the perfect training.
So, in your varied career, Russell, let me guess: ah, you worked in the public service under Mr Whitlam, then under Mr Fraser. Right?