1: cardinal george pell wrote an anonymous memo criticizing the pope’s leadership as a “catastrophe” and it was published on a vatican blog site under a pseudonym last year. the author wrote that “christ is being moved from the centre” of the church under pope francis, and that the vatican’s political prestige had fallen to “a low ebb” under his tenure.
paragraph 2: italian journalist sandro magister said cardinal pell had “wanted me to publish it”. the memo was published last year and the funeral mass for cardinal pell will be held on saturday.
paragraph 3: cardinal pell wrote an article shortly before he died in which he described the pope’s consultation with the catholic laity about issues such as church teaching on sexuality and the role of women as a “toxic nightmare”. he was made finance minister under pope francis in 2014 and was often described as the vatican’s third-ranked official before he left his post in 2017 to return to australia to face trial on child sex abuse offences. he was convicted, then acquitted on appeal. he is australia’s highest ranking catholic and served as archbishop of both melbourne and sydney before he was summoned to the vatican.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-64258319?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=KARANGA
