What happened?
Cardinal George Pell, appointed by Pope Francis to reform Vatican finances, will return to Australia to face charges of historic sex abuse. At a press conference at the Vatican, the cardinal said he was innocent and had faced “relentless character assassination”. Pope Francis has granted him a leave of absence, a Vatican spokesman said.
Police in Australia’s Victoria state said there were “multiple charges” and “multiple complainants” but gave no further details.
What the media are saying
Much coverage focused on what the story meant for Pope Francis. The New York Times said it was “bad news for a pontificate that has mostly bathed in global adoration”. It suggested that Francis had a “blind spot when it comes to sex abuse in his ranks” and quoted abuse survivor Marie Collins, who said Cardinal Pell should have resigned long ago because of his mishandling of abuse cases while a bishop. (Cardinal Pell told a royal commission that he “should have done more” about rumours of abuse but that he thought authorities were dealing with them.)
Angela Shanahan, writing in The Australian, said the media frenzy against the cardinal meant he could “never receive a fair trial”. She quoted Amanda Vanstone, a former senator, who described his critics as “no better than a lynch mob from the dark ages”.
What the vaticanisti are saying
John Allen at Crux said that Cardinal Pell’s departure from the Vatican, coming so soon after the resignation of Libero Milone, the auditor general the cardinal had hired, spelt serious trouble for the Pope’s financial reform. The Secretariat for the Economy, which the cardinal leads, will be “essentially rudderless, trapped in a sort of limbo until [Cardinal Pell’s] long-term status is clarified”.
It is too early to say the Pope’s reform is doomed, Allen said. If the cardinal is able to exonerate himself quickly, he could return to Rome stronger than ever.
“If that’s not how things shake out, however, then those already tempted to write obituaries for Francis’s reform may well feel they’ve been hand-delivered a sensational new way to open their accounts of its demise,” he said.
✣Turkey seizes dozens of Orthodox churches
What happened?
At least 50 Syriac Orthodox churches, monasteries, cemeteries and other properties have been seized by Turkey’s state authority on religion, the Diyanet.
The properties, in the south-eastern province of Mardin, include the 4th-century Mor Gabriel monastery, the oldest Syriac Orthodox monastery in the world.
Why was it under-reported?
Ownership of the properties may have passed to the state but so far little has otherwise changed. To international media it may seem like small fry compared to President Erdoğan’s crackdown on journalists and academics.
The Syriac Orthodox Church does not have a loud voice either. Its community in Turkey numbers only 2,000. (There are only 80,000 Christians in total in the country.) But the seizure of such a large amount of property seems to represent increasing repression for a small, vulnerable group of Christians.
What will happen next?
The Mor Gabriel Foundation is filing a lawsuit for each property seized. Similar seizures in the past have been subject to years of legal wrangling. Unfortunately, churches are also being seized elsewhere in the country.
Across Turkey the future does not look bright for Christians. According to Open Doors International, a charity for persecuted Christians, the country’s “increasing Islamisation” has meant growing pressure on Christians and an increase in violence against them. Turkey has risen from 45 to 37 on the charity’s persecution watch list.
✣The week ahead
A catholic charismatic event will be held in London on Saturday and Sunday. The Catholic Miracle Rally, at Friends House in central London, will feature papal preacher Fr Raniero Cantalamessa, Archbishop Emeritus Kevin McDonald of Southwark and Damian Stayne, founder of the Cor et Lumen Christi community. There will be Adoration, Mass and Confession.
Germany’s chancellor Angela Merkel (pictured) is hosting a G20 summit in Hamburg today. Merkel said that Pope Francis urged her to fight to preserve the Paris climate deal. Her agenda also focuses on free trade and mass migration.
Next Thursday pilgrims from Belarus will flock to Fatima to mark the 100th anniversary of Mary’s third appearance there. Belarusians, who suffered communist rule until 1991, have a great devotion to Our Lady of Fatima. Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz of Minsk said in March: “You will never find a church without a statue of Our Lady of Fatima in my country.”
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