Pope Francis has granted top adviser Cardinal George Pell leave to return to his native Australia to face charges of sexual abuse, a Vatican spokesman has said.
Cardinal Pell, 76, was charged with multiple historical sex crimes, in a case that poses a dilemma for a pontiff who has vowed zero tolerance for such offences.
At a news conference called hours after he was charged by Australian police, the Cardinal said he would return to clear his name after a two-year investigation he described as characterised by "relentless character assassination".
"These charges strengthen my resolve and the court proceedings now offer me the opportunity to clear my name and then return here back to Rome to work," he said.
Cardinal George Pell says court proceedings will offer him the opportunity to clear his name after he was charged with sexual abuse pic.twitter.com/fHIFpFzLuS
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) June 29, 2017
Cardinal Pell is the Vatican's de facto treasury minister and is the highest-ranking Vatican official to be charged with sexual abuse.
He faces "multiple charges in respect of historic sexual offences" from multiple complainants, said police in the Australian state of Victoria, where Cardinal Pell was a country priest in the 1970s.
The police did not specify the charges against the Cardinal nor the ages of the alleged victims nor when the crimes were alleged to have occurred.
The Australian Catholic Church said in a statement that Cardinal Pell strenuously denied the charges.
"He said he is looking forward to his day in court and will defend the charges vigorously," the statement said. It also said his doctors would advise on his travel arrangements.
Cardinal Pell angered victims at a government inquiry into institutional child abuse in Australia last year by saying he was too sick to fly home, testifying instead from Rome.
He was ordered to appear before Melbourne Magistrates Court on 18 July.
The latest development in the long-running case piled pressure on the Pope to make good on promises to sack bishops found guilty of abuse, or of covering it up.
Pope Francis told reporters last year he would wait until Australian justice took its course before taking a position on Cardinal Pell, and that his financial controller since 2014 should not undergo trial by media.
"It's in the hands of the justice system and one cannot judge before the justice system," he said at the time. "After the justice system speaks, I will speak."
Cardinal Pell told the Australian inquiry last year the Church had made "catastrophic" choices by refusing to believe abused children, shuffling abusive priests from parish to parish and relying too heavily on the counsel of priests to solve the problem.
Pope Francis's attempts to root out sexual abuse in the Church have hit stumbling blocks.
Irish abuse survivor Marie Collins, the top non-clerical member of a papal commission on abuse, resigned in frustration earlier this year, citing "shameful" resistance to change within the Vatican.
