Cardinal Pell’s Death Puts A Spotlight On The Catholic Church’s Future

(ANALYSIS) The Catholic Church recently lost a giant. The death of Cardinal George Pell on Jan. 10 at the age of 81 was the literal loss of a giant — he stood at a towering 6 feet, 6 inches and was once an Australian Rules Football player in his youth. But he was also a man who attracted both controversy and consternation.

Many remember Pell for what took place in the last chapter of his life — that of being found guilty of child sexual abuse in 2018. The cardinal won on appeal two years later, the convictions quashed by Australia’s High Court.

Pell also had some very real disagreements with Pope Francis regarding theology and the direction of the church in recent years — something that earned him headlines after his death calling him “divisive” and “controversial.”

READ: Will Pope Francis Resign Now That Benedict XVI Has Died?

Nearly two weeks after his death, Pell continues to be written about in both the secular and Catholic press. A lot of this coverage has been thin on reporting and loaded with commentary, conjecture and analysis. In fact, Pell’s death wasn’t only a reflection of the past but where the church is headed in the future and what Francis’ papacy means.

It’s within this context — and some of the juicier revelations to come out once Pell died — that the late cardinal has kept journalists busy. Once again, the coverage is skewed heavily toward familiar arguments about whether the church should stay true to beliefs regarding marriage and sex that go back 2,000 years or look to the future in order to mesh with the mores of the present.

It is through that prism that Pell has received coverage, especially after a secret memo Pell had penned was made public just days after his death. Here’s how The Associated Press reported on it:

Pell had clashed repeatedly with the Vatican’s Italian bureaucracy during his 2014-2017 term as prefect of the Holy See’s Secretariat for the Economy, which Francis created to try to get a handle on the Vatican’s opaque finances. In his telegram of condolence, Francis credited Pell with having laid the groundwork for the reforms underway, which have included imposing international standards for budgeting and accounting on Vatican offices.

But Pell, a staunch conservative, grew increasingly disillusioned with the direction of Francis’ papacy, including its emphasis on inclusion and canvassing of the laity about the future of the church.

He penned a remarkable memorandum outlining his concerns, and recommendations for the next pope in a future conclave, that began circulating last spring and was published under a pseudonym, “Demos,” on Vatican blog Settimo Cielo.

The blogger Sandro Magister on Wednesday revealed that Pell indeed was the author of the memo, which is an extraordinary indictment of the current pontificate by a onetime close collaborator of Francis.

The memo is divided into two parts — “The Vatican Today” and “The Next Conclave” — and lists a series of points covering everything from Francis’ “weakened” preaching of the Gospel to the precariousness of the Holy See’s finances and the “lack of respect for the law” in the city-state, including in the current financial corruption trial underway that Pell himself had championed.

It was the blog Settimo Cielo — tied to the Italian news magazine L’Espresso and run by the journalist Sandro Magister — that received the spotlight. It’s yet another blog American journalists need to bookmark, especially those not at the Vatican to see and understand the power dynamics present in Rome.

The Washington Post caught up with Magister to ask him details behind the memo. Here’s the key section:

The journalist, Sandro Magister, published the text last March on his Vatican blog, Settimo Cielo.

But then there was a final twist. After the purported author died last week, Magister felt free to reveal his identity: Cardinal George Pell, a giant of the conservative Catholic world.

“He had wanted it to circulate because he deemed it useful to develop a conversation” about the church, Magister told The Washington Post.

That revelation, coupled with other recent pontifical critiques, have quickly dissolved the notion that the Dec. 31 death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, a symbolic leader of the church’s conservative wing, might lessen the opposition to Francis. Some church watchers had expected that this might be a liberating moment for Francis — he’d be, at last, the lone Vatican figure dressing in white. But to the extent there’s been a new phase, it’s been typified by intrigue and acrimony.

At the same time, stories about Pell continued after The Spectator, an English magazine, posthumously published one of the cardinal’s articles in which he skewered the Synod of Synodality, a multi-year process spearheaded by Francis that involves listening to Catholics around the world about the direction of the church and potentially making changes in the future. Critics see it as an evolving attempt at Vatican III.

Published on Jan. 11, Pell wrote the following, as posted by The Spectator:

The Catholic Synod of Bishops is now busy constructing what they think of as ‘God’s dream’ of synodality. Unfortunately this divine dream has developed into a toxic nightmare despite the bishops’ professed good intentions.

They have produced a 45-page booklet which presents its account of the discussions of the first stage of ‘listening and discernment’, held in many parts of the world, and it is one of the most incoherent documents ever sent out from Rome.

While we thank God that Catholic numbers around the globe, especially in Africa and Asia are increasing, the picture is radically different in Latin America with losses to the Protestants as well as the secularists.

He also noted:

Because of differences of opinion on abortion, contraception, the ordination of women to the priesthood and homosexual activity, some felt that no definitive positions on these issues can be established or proposed. This is also true of polygamy, and divorce and remarriage.

However the document is clear on the special problem of the inferior position of women and the dangers of clericalism, although the positive contribution of many priests is acknowledged.

What is one to make of this potpourri, this outpouring of New Age good will? It is not a summary of Catholic faith or New Testament teaching. It is incomplete, hostile in significant ways to the apostolic tradition and nowhere acknowledges the New Testament as the Word of God, normative for all teaching on faith and morals. The Old Testament is ignored, patriarchy rejected and the Mosaic Law, including the Ten Commandments, is not acknowledged.

Pell’s observations are particularly noteworthy given Pope Benedict XVI’s death this past New Year’s Eve.

It’s this association with Catholic traditionalists that made Pell a figure the mainstream chose to ignore at first, even in the days after his death, and then the subject of negative coverage once his recent writings were made public.

A very good example of this is chaining Pell to political conservatives.

The Saturday Paper, a weekly Australian publication, goes on to say that Pell spent decades cultivating media owned by Rupert Murdoch, who is a Catholic. It should come as no surprise that Pell, like any cardinal, would cultivate relationships with those in the press. For example, John Allen penned a wonderful piece at Crux about Pell. This section makes the point:

The last time I spoke to Pell was about three weeks ago. He’d called in part to see how I was doing in my recovery from esophageal surgery last fall, but, more to the point, to chide me for a recent article I’d written. I’d called Pope Francis “decisive,” and Pell was livid – the pope’s problem, he thundered, is that he routinely fails to act, with his dithering about the German “synodal way” the latest case in point.

Having done everything but call me brain-dead, Pell concluded by saying, “Well, take care of yourself … we need your voice. Even if you do sometimes muck it up, at least you’re paying attention.” He then hung up without waiting for me to reply.

It was vintage Pell.

I’ve known Pell since his days in Sydney. If memory serves, I think my first interview with him was during the “liturgy wars” in English-speaking Catholicism in the 2000s, when Pell led a new commission created in Rome to supervise the translation of liturgical texts into English.

I remember being stunned at how blunt he was, using peppery adjectives to describe a few of his opponents that would never see the light of day in a family newspaper. From that point on, we struck up a sort of symbiotic friendship – Pell loved getting the latest Roman gossip, and I always enjoyed his assessments of people and politics.

When I needed somebody of note to speak at the Rome launch of Crux in 2014, Pell was happy to step in, and I was thrilled – the launch took place smack dab in the middle of a contentious Synod of Bishops on the Family in which Pell was, inevitably, a leading voice for the conservative side, which I knew would guarantee media interest in our event.

Pell didn’t disappoint. The main bone of contention at that synod was the vexed question of communion for divorced and civilly remarried Catholics, and Pell made clear what side he was on: “As Christians, we follow Christ,” he said that night. “Some may wish Jesus might have been a little softer on divorce, but he wasn’t. And I’m sticking with him.”  

Pell’s death, like that of Benedict, again highlights the doctrinal fissures present, like it our not, in the modern church.

While the doctrinal fights pitting traditionalists against progressives continue to highlight the power dynamics at the Vatican, at this point it is obvious that trying to shape what a future papal conclave would look like is the ultimate goal.

This post originally ran at GetReligion.

Clemente Lisi is a senior editor at Religion Unplugged and teaches journalism at The King’s College in New York City. He is the author of “The FIFA World Cup: A History of the Planet’s Biggest Sporting Event.” Follow him on Twitter @ClementeLisi.