Not ready to join the Pell bandwagon yet

There is a very sweet man who has been defending Cardinal Pell with passion and devotion. I haven't said a word to him about it because anything less than saddling up and riding out with him on crusade will not do for him. Cardinal Pell's conviction is so ridiculous that whether you like the man or not you have to admit that what he is accused of is impossible. Think about how many people are in a sacristy after Mass when the bishop comes to your own parish.  Now imagine your elderly bishop attacking two choir boys in full view of all those people. 

Perhaps Australia as several fiery Pell defenders have said, is at the end of the day, just anti-Catholic as you would expect from a daughter of England. Perhaps the country is in the grip of hysteria like the US was in the 80s. Remember that shameful episode? Day care workers and owners were accused of eating babies, flying in balloons, raping  toddlers in the classroom and in underground tunnels and cutting children with knives that left no scars or caused no bleeding. People were convicted and went to prison on the strength of that mad testimony so Australia is no worse than we are in that respect.

All that being said, I don't feel like jumping on the Cardinal Pell bandwagon. I think he is innocent of what he was accused of in this case and unless the Australians have completely lost their minds his appeal in this case will be successful  but I can't ignore those nagging rumors about him that have swirled in Australia and out for years. Those rumors could have been filthy lies. The old man who said he saw a naked Pell strutting and posing in a changing room in front of boys could have lied. The young males who claimed that Pell groped their genitalia in the pool could have lied. The people who claim that Cardinal Pell is homosexual could be lying. Maybe it is a conspiracy and the Vatican officials who found Pell's interference in their shady accounting at the Vatican bank had a hand in getting rid of him but I feel a strong urge towards caution, waiting and seeing in this case. Sorry.