Another cleric conviction in Australia

[KevinK]

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — An Australian archbishop on Tuesday became the most senior Roman Catholic cleric in the world convicted of covering up child sex abuse in a test case that holds to account church hierarchy that kept silent in the face of an international pedophile crisis.
Magistrate Robert Stone handed down the verdict against Archbishop of Adelaide Philip Wilson in Newcastle Local Court, north of Sydney, following a magistrate-only trial.
Wilson, 67, had pleaded not guilty to concealing a serious crime committed by another person — the sexual abuse of children by pedophile priest James Fletcher in the 1970s.
He had made four attempts in the past three years to have the charge struck out without a trial.

The conviction is another step toward holding the church to account for a global abuse crisis that has also engulfed Pope Francis’ financial minister, Australian Cardinal George Pell.

 

[OsculeturMeOsculo]

I heard that abuse in general is sort of common in Australia.

 

[Greenfields]

I think we had this very conversation last night,please search that thread.

 

[LittleFlower]

Australian Archbishop guilty of concealing child sex abuse Social Justice

 

[LittleFlower]

I heard that abuse is sort of common in Australia.

It was common in many places, sadly.

 

[stpurl]

Not that I in any way, shape, or form condone abuse or ‘coverup’, but it should be noted that in the 1970s the archbishop would have been 30 at most, and that during the 1970s the AMA (and the doctors’ associations in other countries, including Australia) believed, and stated as expert opinion, that pedophilia could be cured and that when cured, the proper treatment was to send the ‘cured’ person out with a ‘clean slate’. Would a 30 year old cleric be supposed to possess knowledge that lay decades ahead and ‘call out’ expert medical opinion as wrong?? How would it have looked had the then-30 year old cleric decided to ‘buck’ the medical profession on anything else?

This was not just in the Catholic Church but elsewhere --schools, public institutions, etc.

Times change. Hindsight is always 20/20. But you should not be able to impose the laws and knowledge, if you will, of the 2010s (or even the 1990s at earliest) onto events of the 1970s.

Remember too that in the 1970s a wife (in the US anyway) could not legally be raped by her husband, since they were married. There’s probably quite a few people still alive who could, under the current laws, have the husbands arrested and prosecuted. I don’t notice a huge rush for that, though.

 

[ArcillaJohn]

I live in the Adelaide Archdiocese. It’s very unfortunate what’s been going on, but if this is the path of justice then we must move in that direction. From my interactions with the Archbishop I find him as a very genuine man, and I don’t believe he would willingly lie to the courts, so I hope you would keep him and our archdiocese in your prayers. Archbishop Wilson is also physically declining, not being able to perform his duties as well as he used to, especially not being able to go to the parishes for confirmations, and this past Pentecost Sunday at the Marian procession, I noticed he did not process with the rest of us.

Archbishop Wilson will step aside from his duties completely this Friday, and it is most likely that our Vicar General, Fr Philip Marshall will take over as he has before in the place of the Archbishop. I am not sure if the Archbishop will end up deciding on retiring but he is facing jail time for this, so once again please pray for our Archdiocese!

 

[Roseeurekacross]

You are in my prayers.