And there have been scandals from time to time. Yes, we know there is a gay culture in the Vatican and always has been. Why? Because there was never any factual basis for the claim that he was gay. In his acclaimed biography of Paul VI, Peter Hebblethwaite never even alludes to his sexuality. And in Rome, especially in the Rome of the Vatican, the rumour-mill never sleeps, and its nefarious produce is often employed to devastating effect. Paul VI’s homosexuality is an old rumour. The author’s central preoccupation is the “homosexualisation of the Church” – and he purports to find it everywhere.
This is a deeply disturbing situation, but Martel is given to much exaggeration. Some prominent Cardinals – George Pell being one of them, Theodore McCarrick and the late Alfonso Lopez Trujillo of Colombia are others – who have been most vociferous in condemning homosexuality, the use of condoms even in the battle against AIDS, and methods of family planning that involve any form of artificial contraception, have been exposed as sexual predators, abusing altar boys, seminarians and other young males. That some very senior figures in the Church lead double lives is at this stage well attested to. To this Martel adds his own observation: “The more vehemently opposed a cleric is to gays, the stronger his homophobic obsession, the more likely it is that he is insincere, and that his vehemence conceals something”. Martel cites a comment made by Pope Francis as showing an acute awareness of this: “Behind rigidity there is always something hidden, in many cases a double life”. Sub-titled ‘Power, Homosexuality, Hypocrisy’, the book was published in eight languages and in 20 countries on the day the global summit opened in Rome, and it is an unrelenting expose in which homophilia is depicted as often lurking behind homophobia. The main focus, inevitably, is on the Vatican of which the author has this to say: “The Vatican has one of the biggest gay communities in the world, and I doubt whether, even in San Francisco’s Castro, the emblematic gay quarter, though more mixed today, there are quite as many gays!” "From his earliest actions as an archbishop, Cardinal Pell has taken a strong stand against child sexual abuse and put in place processes to enable complaints to be brought forward and independently investigated," it said.Entitled In the Closet of the Vatican, it was written by Frederic Martel, a French journalist, and paints a picture of rampant homosexuality at all levels in the Catholic Church. "And I think it's critical that he is moved aside, that he is sent back to Australia, and that the Pope takes the strongest action against him."Ī statement issued by Pell's office said the allegations were "false and misleading". "Given the position of George Pell as a cardinal of the church and a position of huge authority within the Vatican, I think he is a massive, massive thorn in the side of Pope Francis's papacy if he's allowed to remain," added Saunders, a British survivor of child sexual abuse.
He alleged in an interview with Australia's Channel Nine that Pell had acted with "callousness, cold-heartedness, almost sociopathic I would go as far as to say, this lack of care", in his approach towards abuse victims. Peter Saunders, who was hand-picked by the Pope six months ago to be one of the church's commissioners for the protection of children, said Pell not only had a moral obligation to return but should be removed from his Vatican role. "The royal commission will ask him to give evidence in the second of the Ballarat hearings." "The chair has received a letter from Cardinal Pell indicating that he is prepared to come to Australia to give evidence," the commission said in a statement. The cardinal said last week he was willing to do so and on today the commission officially requested he appear in person when the inquiry next meets in the Victorian town of Ballarat, at a date to be determined. Other victims had demanded Pell, who was appointed by Pope Francis in February 2014 to make the Vatican's finances more transparent, return to give evidence to The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. That victim was his nephew, David Ridsdale, who alleged he confided in family friend Pell about the assaults and that he was asked by him what it would cost to buy his silence.