It’s been a strange week for recently retired pastor Michael Shadbolt at Doveton’s Holy Family Church.
In the first days of renouncing his priestly robes, Father Shadbolt had to digest the shock of Cardinal George Pell being found guilty by a Victorian County Court jury of the indecent assault of two 13-year-old choir boys.
Father Shadbolt will reserve judgement on Pell until the outcome of the cardinal’s appeal against his conviction.
“The main thing we have to do is show support for the victims but I am still hoping that Pell is finally cleared.
“I find it very difficult to believe Pell is guilty.”
It was Pell who first appointed Father Shadbolt to leading the Doveton parish 20 years ago.
However, Father Shadbolt, at the time fresh from working in Latin America, was not told by Pell of the parish’s “dark history”.
It had been a dumping ground for four priests accused of child sex abuse in the 1970s-’90s, most infamously the violent Father Peter Searson.
“Had I known the dark history, I probably wouldn’t have taken (the position at Doveton).
“But now I’m glad I did. They’ve been the most fabulous years of my life.
“What’s been so special about it is the people.”
Father Shadbolt has been guiding the parish through a series of horrific revelations at Royal Commissions into child sex abuse at institutions including the Catholic Church.
From early in Searson’s tenure starting in 1984, the claims against him included allegedly molesting and striking children, pointing a handgun at child cleaners, flinging a cat by its tail to its death, killing a baby bird with a screwdriver and showing children a dead body in a coffin.
Yet he wasn’t removed from the position until 1997 by the newly-appointed Melbourne Archbishop Pell.
Father Shadbolt has described Pell as a “hero” for dispatching Searson. Others have said Pell should have acted earlier as a bishop, though a recent Royal Commission made no findings on Pell’s conduct.
“I have always admired him,” Fr Shadbolt said of Pell.
“I believe he’s a man of integrity. He did the right thing in moving as quickly as he could in getting rid of Searson.”
If Pell’s appeal fails, the Catholic Church will suffer yet another “body blow” – “though we’ve been copping body blows for the last 20 years”.
“Will it be the final knock-out blow? I don’t know.
“I think there is great sadness and mourning in our church. These are sad days for us.”
