In an essay he co-authored on subsidiarity, Cardinal Pell wrote about the preferences of some liberal Christians living in countries with more liberal episcopacies.

During the pontificates of St John Paul II and Benedict XVI, such Christians "were often keen to decrease the authority of the Roman Curia and complained about excessive centralisation of decision-making in the Vatican".

"With the advent of a new Pope often estimated (wrongly in our belief) to be a doctrinal liberal, some of these more liberal elements might be more relaxed about Roman leadership," the authors noted.

"[They would be] preferring that to a devolution of wider decision-making powers to a national hierarchy of a more conservative hue."

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