Cardinal George Pell has been ordered by a magistrate in Australia to go to court over allegations of sexual assault, making him the most senior member of the Catholic church to be taken to court in the recent exposition of scandal after scandal concerning sex crimes and Catholic leaders; a 5-year national inquiry has found that the Catholic Church received more complaints about sexual assault than any other organization, with at least 140 reports of abuse occurring in one city alone while the Church remained dismissive of accusations to the point of allowing the abuse to continue without meaningful punishment. Pell, who is the Archbishop of Sydney and Melbourne as well as the head of economic affairs at the Vatican (on leave for the trial), is charged with sexually assaulting 4 boys in the 1990s, a charge he denies but will now have to go to court over thanks to the magistrate's ruling. Though public opinion on him is divided, it's good that he can finally receive persecution for the crimes if he is found guilty or restitution if he is found otherwise.
This is similar to when Nixon was taken to the Supreme Court over the release of documents showing governmental lying and misconduct concerning Vietnam (the Pentagon Papers), as it was another situation in which a case was brought against a person of high standing/position over charges of years of cover-ups for systemic wrongdoing by members of a powerful organization. Here, Nixon is the important official, the crime from years past was an unreported escalation of the Vietnam conflict while knowingly lying to the media, and the powerful organization is the US government; and though Nixon didn't face any jail time for his role in misleading the public, the distrust it fostered in the governmental system has lasted for decades. Let's see if the Catholic church is spared the same fate.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/cardinal-george-pell-will-face-trial-on-historical-sex-offense-charges/2018/05/01/76adb5a8-4cf1-11e8-af46-b1d6dc0d9bfe_story.html?utm_term=.a2c984265bf6
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