Survivors of abuse by Catholic clergy in Australia answer questions.

FOR the survivors of child abuse sitting in the first five rows of the makeshift hearing room of the royal commission there were moments of harrowing memory recall.

No-one was referred to by name, no detail provided of the circumstance but the catalogue of clergy abuse over a 30-year period as detailed by Senior Counsel to proceedings Gail Furness was all too familiar to many if not all sitting motionless there in their ranks.

There was one clergy with a penchant for bathing with boys, another for camping trips of abuse or late night skinny dips, boys bed sharing with priests and or Christian Brothers and evidence of distressing acceptance by young lads who just warned their chums they too had to take their turn in being “bum buddies” with a certain church figure. There was kissing, fondling and photographing in that list and the hearing heard it was common knowledge and it was rife.

It made all in the room uncomfortable not least for the many collared clergy sitting in their standard black on the left hand side of the room.

It was in some respects like an inconvenient marriage where bride and groom families take sides in the church, or in this instance a hired room for a royal commission with clergy and church supporters on the left of the room and victims and majority of media on the right and all focused on the man at the front holding court and a big screen showing a pixelled blurred image of Furness.

Cardinal George Pell is seen on a screen as he gives evidence to the Royal Comission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse via video link from Rome. Picture: AAP / Lukas CochSource:Supplied

The mood in this extraordinary hearing of the $435 million royal commission was tense but not just for what we had to hear but for the other men in black, plain clothed police and fearsome looking Vatican security guards with ear pieces sitting among the rows on both sides of the house in anticipation of trouble.

It was perhaps apt Cardinal George Pell’s cross examination was in the Verdi Room of Hotel Quirinale, named after famed 19th Century opera composer Giuseppe Verdi who stayed in the hotel and performed next door some of the world’s greatest operas.

LIBERAL MP: Cardinal Pell could be seen as a victim

VICTIMS’ PLEA TO CARDINAL PELL: Be a man tell the truth

Seeking the truth into their abuse after many years of torture. Picture: Ella PellegriniSource:Supplied

Paul Levey flew to Rome to face off with Cardinal George Pell. Pictue: Ella PellegriniSource:Supplied

This was indeed a tragedy and an uncomfortable scene but one that needs to be played out and will do so in at least four acts over successive days this week.