Yesterday, by declaring the confessional inviolate, Cardinal George Pell continued the Catholic Church’s long practice of hindering child abuse investigations. Senior correspondent Barry Everingham comments.
Yesterday, in his act of making himself totally irrelevant, Cardinal George Pell made it clear, as far as he’s concerned, what’s heard in the confessional stays in the confessional.
Which means, if a hapless victim of sexual abuse by a priest incorrectly seeks forgiveness for what was done to him, the priest hearing the confession can remain mum and the perpetrator can go on having his hideous fun.
Pell is a disgrace as a man, as a priest of the Catholic Church and has no place to go ― except perhaps to Rome, where he can tell his beads to hearts content.
My friend and colleague Tess Lawrence, elsewhere in Independent Australia, has written a Walkleys Award type exposé of Pell and is required reading.
She told me this morning of her work with the Church of Rome, and the statements she took from men who had been abused by priests, She told of young boys who went to confession to the very priests that abused them, thinking that they (the boys) were the ones who had done wrong.
Those heinous priests gave them prayers as penance to absolve “their” sins!
Yet Pell – the ogre that he is – blames the media for the mess his church has got itself into.
Where in the name of Gad is this bloke coming from?
It is high time all priests took the bull by the horns and had the balls to ignore the secrecy of the confessional, ignore the Pell edict and the man himself, and hightail it to the police with names dates and details of what had been told to them by victims.
And while they are at it, lock up the confessionals and throw away the keys to prevent the many thousands of the faithful from further humiliating themselves by assisting many of those hearing their confessions from getting their rocks off by hearing normal sexual exploits which the likes of Pell and his cohorts regard as sins.
What has a seven-year-old boy and girl got to confess?
As a non-Catholic, I’m told that’s the age those gorgeous and innocent kids receive their first “holy communion” and are fed the line that the wine and the bread they are given is the body and blood of Jesus Christ!
It’s called transubstantiation ― and is a load of crap.
Here’s the official explanation of the purpose of confession.
The reconciling of man to God is the purpose of this “sacrament”.
When we sin (such as, when a grown priest fondles a little boys genitals) we deprive ourselves of God’s grace. (Italics mine.)
And by doing so, we make it even easier to sin more.
The Church says the only way out of this downwards cycle is to acknowledge our sins, repent of them and ask God’s forgiveness.
Maybe if the dirty grown-up priests would keep their hands to themselves, none of the above nonsense would be necessary and decent normal devout Catholics could begin enjoying normal pursuits like sex and even masturbation.
I’m reminded of a line by the redoubtable Dorothy Parker when reviewing a children’s book, who summed up her thoughts with the following:
“Tonstant Weader fwowed up.”!
That’s why I’m ending this piece right now.
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