The Catholic church failed to act on the ‘horror story’ of pedophiles in its midst, Melbourne archbishop Denis Hart has told the royal commission.

“‘What is now apparent to me is that there was knowledge and a failure to act,’ Hart told the child abuse royal commission.

“‘Reading the victims’ statements that I have in preparation for the commission, I have just been totally appalled by the extent and the depravity of the offenders and the suffering and ruination of lives of the survivors.’

“Hart said there had been a terrible failure by the church resulting from the passivity or inactivity of his predecessors.

“But he excluded Cardinal George Pell, the Melbourne archbishop from 1996 to 2001, from the criticism.”

By Australian Associated Press in The Guardian — Click here to read the rest of this story.