Former governor general Peter Hollingworth, who resigned over his handling of child sexual abuse in the Anglican church, has died.<\/p>\n
Hollingworth, who devoted much of his life to fighting poverty, served as the Anglican archbishop of Brisbane<\/a> for 11 years from 1990, the first Australian-born person to hold the position.<\/p>\n He died on Tuesday, aged 91.<\/p>\n Appointed governor general in 2001 by former Liberal prime minister John Howard, Hollingworth used his position to advocate for Indigenous rights and disadvantaged people.<\/p>\n But Australia\u2019s only clerical viceroy spent less than two years in the role before being forced to resign.<\/p>\n In 2003, a board of inquiry into the handling of complaints of sexual abuse in the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane found that Hollingworth, as archbishop, failed to act on knowledge of abuse.<\/p>\n He allowed two priests to remain in the church despite knowing they had sexually assaulted children.<\/p>\n A church inquiry in 2023 found he had committed misconduct by allowing the pedophiles to remain in the church but said he remained fit for ministry.<\/p>\n Hollingworth accepted the investigation\u2019s findings, saying he \u201cmade mistakes and I cannot undo them\u201d but had committed no crimes.<\/p>\n There is no suggestion Hollingworth abused children himself.<\/p>\n In a statement on Tuesday, Anglican Archbishop of Brisbane Jeremy Greaves said the church sent its condolences to Hollingworth\u2019s family.<\/p>\n \u201cAnglican Church of Southern Queensland acknowledges with deep regret the past failings of the church,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201c(It) apologises unreservedly to those who have suffered abuse, distress, isolation, and harm caused by the church\u2019s failure to respond with integrity and care when it was needed most.\u201d<\/p>\n Hollingworth was named Australian of the Year in 1991.<\/p>\n He announced in 2023 he would no longer practise as an Anglican priest to \u201cend distress\u201d for survivors.<\/p>\n In Australia, children, young adults, parents and teachers can contact the Kids Helpline<\/a> on 1800 55 1800, or Bravehearts<\/a> on 1800 272 831, and adult survivors can contact Blue Knot Foundation<\/a> on 1300 657 380. In the UK, the NSPCC<\/a> offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac<\/a>) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331. In the US, call or text the Childhelp<\/a> abuse hotline on 800-422-4453. Other sources of help can be found at Child Helplines International<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former governor general Peter Hollingworth, who resigned over his handling of child sexual abuse in the Anglican church,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681992,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-681991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=681991"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681991\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}