[ad_1]
ROME, Jan. 11 (AP) — Cardinal George Pell, a former financial adviser to Pope Francis, spent 404 days in solitary confinement in his native Australia on child sex abuse charges before his conviction was unanimously overturned, Died in Rome on Tuesday. He is 81 years old.
Pell’s successor, the Archbishop of Melbourne, Archbishop Peter Komensoli, said Pell suffered fatal heart complications following hip surgery. Pell was in Rome last week for the funeral of Pope Benedict XVI.
“This news comes as a shock to all of us,” Sydney Catholic Archbishop Anthony Fisher said in a statement on Facebook. “Please pray for the rest of Cardinal Pell’s soul, his family and all those who loved him and grieve for him at this time.”
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said plans were underway to hold a funeral at the Vatican and bring Pell’s body back to Australia.
Read also | US: Ex-cop officer to be executed in Texas for hiring two to kill his estranged wife
“This will be a difficult day for many people, especially Catholics, and my condolences to all those who mourn today,” Albanese said.
Journalist Lucie Morris-Marr, who wrote the book “The Fall” about Pell’s trial, said on Twitter that Pell’s death “will greatly touch the hearts of many affected by Catholic child sexual abuse.” Australians, not just those involved in the trial.”
Pell, a former archbishop of Melbourne and Sydney, became the Vatican’s third-ranked official after Pope Francis appointed him in 2014 to overhaul the Vatican’s notoriously opaque finances, becoming the Holy See’s first-ever fiscal czar.
He spent three years as minister at the newly formed Economic Secretariat, where he tried to implement international budgeting, accounting and transparency standards.
But Pell returned to Australia in 2017 to try to clear himself of child sex allegations made during his tenure as archbishop.
A Victorian County Court jury initially convicted him of molesting two 13-year-old choir boys at St Patrick’s Cathedral shortly after he became archbishop of Melbourne in the 1990s. Pell spent 404 days in solitary confinement before the full Supreme Court unanimously overturned his conviction in 2020.
During his time in prison, Pell kept a diary that recorded everything from his prayers and Bible readings to his conversations with visiting priests and prison guards. The diary was turned into a triptych, “Prison Diaries,” the proceeds of which went to pay his huge legal bills.
In his diary, Pell reflects on the nature of suffering, Pope Francis’ papacy and the humiliation of solitary confinement as he struggles to clear himself of a crime he insists he never committed.
Pell and his supporters believe he is the scapegoat for all crimes over the Australian Catholic Church’s botched response to clergy sexual abuse. Victims and critics say he encapsulates everything wrong with the way the church is dealing with the problem.
“In retrospect, I was probably overly optimistic that I would get bail,” Pell said in an interview at his home in Rome in 2021. He credited his “glass half full” attitude to his Christian faith.
Even after his acquittal, Pell’s reputation was tarnished by the scandal.
The institutional response to the Australian Royal Commission into Child Sexual Abuse found he was aware of clergy molesting children in the 1970s but had not done enough to address the problem.
Pell later said in a statement that he was “surprised” by the committee’s findings. “These views are not supported by evidence,” Pell’s statement said.
With his rather gruff, no-nonsense Australian sensibilities, Pell has often clashed with the old Italian guard of the Vatican during the three years he has struggled to get hold of the Vatican’s assets and expenses. He was vindicated when Vatican prosecutors tried 10 people in 2021, including his one-time nemesis, over a string of alleged financial crimes.
After Pell returned to Rome after his release from prison, he had a well-publicized private audience with Francis.
“He recognized what I was trying to do,” Pell said of the pope in a 2020 interview. “And, you know, I think it’s unfortunate that the revelations and developments justify that.”
Francis said the same thing in a recent interview with Italy’s Mediaset broadcaster, praising Pell for putting the Vatican on a path to financial transparency and lamenting that he had been forced to abandon his efforts to face “defamation” from allegations of domestic abuse.
“It was Pell who showed us the way forward. He’s a great guy and we owe him a lot,” Francis said last month.
Pell was born on June 8, 1941, the eldest of three children of heavyweight boxing champion and publican, George Pell, was an Anglican. His mother, Margaret Lillian (née Burke), came from an Irish Catholic family.
He grew up in the Victorian town of Ballarat. He is 193cm (6ft 4in) tall and is a talented Australian Rules football player. He was offered a professional football contract to play for Richmond, but he chose seminary.
While in Melbourne, he established the Melbourne Response Mechanism, the world’s first agreement to investigate complaints of clergy sexual abuse and compensate victims. However, many victims of abuse have been critical of the system and the compensation payments, saying they were designed more to protect the church from lawsuits.
After his conviction was overturned, Pell divided his time between Sydney and Rome, where he took part in the typical life of a retired cardinal, attended Vatican events and liturgical feasts, and otherwise learned about the Church news.
“I’ve become very Italian,” Pell told a visitor during a lull in Rome during the coronavirus pandemic.
A Requiem Mass will be held in Rome, but Pell is expected to be buried in Sydney. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
[ad_2]
Source link