Cardinal George Pell Analysis

In recent media discussion there have been many controversial views seen on the topic of Cardinal George Pell’s response to accusations of sexual child abuse against other catholic priests in Australia. One editorial discussing this topic published in The Sydney Morning Herald on the 21st of February 2016, titled “Cardinal George Pell must humble himself in abuse hearings in Rome”, contends that Pell has not been humble in how he has dealt with the sexual abuse accusations toward the Catholic Church. The tone of this article is somewhat aggressive and firm influencing the average reader to agree to their contention. An opinion piece written by Frank O’Shea published in The Sydney Morning Herald on the 23rd of February 2016 titled “Cardinal

The author has used supporting arguments such as Pell denying victims claims, not taking responsibility and hiding behind procedure. In the second paragraph of this article the author has used an appeal to justice on behalf of the people affected by the abuse “Their desire is simple: they want the cardinal, whose doctors have given evidence he is too ill to fly back to Australia, to face the same conditions as they did when appearing before the commission.”. This firm toned appeal shows the reader that the author is on the victims’ side, adding reason for the reader to agree with the author. Emotive language has been used to describe Pell and his actions as “jarring”, “lacking the instinctive emotional intelligence”, “indeed humility”, also saying the Catholic Church has “profoundly failed some of its most valuable parishioners”. This gives the reader negative feelings towards these people. In the closing paragraph of this editorial a cliché is used with an emotional appeal saying Pell “must take to heart the suffering of his accusers”, which will have readers feeling emotionally attached to the idea of Pell causing people to suffer. Lastly the author uses, in a firm tone, repetition as emphasis to harden his point of view to the reader saying “He must be sensitive. He must be humble. He must understand the

In both articles the authors use attacks toward the catholic leaders and their institution having the reader feel negatively toward them. Also both articles use descriptive language to both attack and praise, such as the first article stating Pell “vehemently rejected” allegations and the second article commenting on the “strident common tone” of the media.

The first article is much more aggressive in tone using many more attacks compared to the second article’s calmer sympathetic approach. The second article contains more uncommonly used words than the first such as skiving and jibing, which may suggest the second articles target audience as being more well read or older than the second articles audience. The second article displays a lot of sympathy toward Cardinal Pell saying he is a “scapegoat, banished to the desert” while the first article alleged he was “hiding behind