An Australian for All Seasons

Prison Journal: Volume 3
George Cardinal Pell
Ignatius Press
2021
339 pages

Last year in the February and October editions of Position Papers, Tim O’Sullivan reviewed Volumes I and II of Cardinal Pell’s Prison Journal. Now Fr Conor Donnelly reviews the third and final volume of the diaries – his review includes comments from people in various countries.

George Weigel has an afterword to the journal which throws all these diaries into relief. He calls for a public investigation into the travesties of policing and prosecution and the failure of the justice system in the state of Victoria, and ponders why this has not taken place. Why is there no investigation into why the Victoria Police Department went trawling for complaints against a public figure Why is there no investigation into the Office of Public Prosecutions which seems to have allowed an unhinged mob to have an influence on the bringing to trial a case in which the prosecution had no case? Who was paying for the mob and its propaganda in the form of professionally printed placards?

The media blackout imposed by the trial judge allowed the most lurid anti-Pell stories to circulate in the Australian Press, while the Cardinal’s defenders were muzzled because the public did not know that the prosecution case had been shredded in the first trial.

The two judges who upheld Pell’s conviction were eviscerated, legally speaking, by the seven to zero decision of the High Court to quash their judgement but there has been no reckoning with this fact and the importance of standing up to the mob and the media when justice demands it.

Louise Milligan, an employee of the publicly funded Australian Broadcasting Corporation, wrote a lurid book in 2013 The Cardinal, which set the persecution of Pell in motion. Why was a tax supported employee of a state broadcasting entity permitted to publish rubbish and promote it at the public’s expense? Is the State broadcasting company permitted to persecute a public figure because his views do not conform to those of Australian media personnel? If it can commit calumny after calumny against a public personality it dislikes because of his politics, how does that distinguish it from state funded media in the People’s Republic of China or Putin’s Russia? These questions from an independent observer are worth noting. While His Eminence does hint in these directions, refinement and serenity prevent him from demanding any sort of redress.

Hilaire Belloc emphasises the hatred that exists in each period of history for the Catholic Church. The testimony of Cardinal Pell could well be a good example of this hatred. The title of the book could have been the Passion of Cardinal Pell. 

In spite of the events and circumstances, His Eminence manages a very supernatural outlook throughout. His journal is a story of faith, hope and peace, as well as fortitude and perseverance. Anyone going through a crisis in their life could find solace in this story. The extent of the humiliation and injustice is remarkable. Prayer and the Mass are a constant source of strength.

His insight into solitary confinement is interesting. You don’t expect a TV set to be present and neither do you expect a Cardinal to be following the latest horse-racing excitement. Humanity behind the clerical office is heart warming.

His advocacy of crucifixion Christianity and of the Judeo-Christian ethic heightened the hostility against him. He was truly tested by fire in the furnace of humiliation. The media are moulding public opinion throughout, often with no hint of due process or of innocent until proven guilty. The injustice of this and of those responsible for the charade in the justice system is immense. The State of Victoria does not impress. His case highlights the importance of integrity among journalists. Truth in the media must be paramount. Was professional ethics among journalists ever in such short supply? Often the impression is that the goal is to transmit anything other than truth.

It is uncommon for prisoners to be so articulate and to keep such a detailed diary, which must have taken effort. The vision from “inside” is informative. He travels from a daily commentary on the Psalms from the breviary, to Brexit, to Ballarat. He is grateful for the presence of the Neocatechumenal Way in Australia. They began forty years ago and now have two flourishing seminaries, one in Perth and the other in Sydney. They now have seventy five communities across Australia. Each diary entry ends with a prayer, one of them states: “God Our Father, help us to remember that your spirit is still with the Church, so that just as the Benedictines in the sixth century, the Franciscans and the Dominicans in the thirteenth century and the Jesuits in the sixteenth century rose up to meet the challenges of the times, so too today groups like Opus Dei and the Neocatechumenal Way will help us hand on the faith.”

A few bishops, who are named, visited Cardinal Pell in prison, but it seems many did not. Weigel publicly questions the President of the Bishops Conference for making a statement “that we should let justice take its course”, when it was clear to all that what was taking place was not justice.

Cardinal Chaput comments: “Two lessons emerge from this astounding work. The first is the length to which a hate filled judicial process will go against an innocent man. The second is the power of a good man’s endurance in the face of humiliation and poisonous deceit.”

Bishop Robert Barron comments: “This book provides a window into the soul of a man enduring the crucible of imprisonment, false accusation, loss of reputation, and deep uncertainty in regard to his future. What we see through that window is not bitterness, anger or fear, but equanimity, graciousness, calmness of spirit and forgiveness towards his enemies. Anyone interested in what radical surrender to Christ looks like should read this luminous text.”

There are many things for all countries to ponder in the light of this case. The journals are not just a simple diary of man in prison: they are a commentary on the world and the Church in the twenty-first century from an Oxford educated, high ranking Prelate who has seen it all.

Much remains to be seen on whether there was a linkup between the financial reform in the Vatican and the case against Cardinal Pell. He has not ruled out such a connection. Of his work there he states that “although we did not completely finish the job we did break the back of the criminal network in the Vatican”. He names names.

While the three journals are informative and worth reading, Volume Three is perhaps the most interesting because the case is at an advanced stage and lines are clearly drawn. Excitement mounts as you get nearer to verdict day. Cardinal Pell received a visit from a sympathetic former Prime Minister.

Life in prison was no walk in the park. He was handcuffed and manacled at the ankles when being moved, subjected to all sorts of humiliations at eighty years of age. He was to be given no special treatment. This went on for over a year.

There is humour. He does admit that the food in prison was better than his boarding school or at Propaganda Fide in Rome in the 1960s. His day is punctuated by volumes of letters of support from all over the world. Three thousand from the nunciature in Madrid alone, some from Moscow, a lady in Singapore is a regular. He makes a lot of his Irish roots and the letters he has received from there, as well as the great Irish influence on the Church in Australia. The Pell issue was hotter than any Australian Open or Melbourne Cup.

Overall the impression is that of man who towers above many of his contemporaries in Church and State, an Australian for All Seasons. One resolution one can take from these pages is to pray more for the Holy Father. Cardinal Pell has spellt out why.