Early Life and Education
Pell was born in Ballarat, Victoria, to George Arthur and Margaret Lillian (née Burke) Pell. His father, a non-practising Anglican whose ancestors were from Leicestershire in England, was a heavyweight boxing champion; his mother was a devout Catholic of Irish descent. During World War II, his father served in the Australian Defence Force. His sister, Margaret, became a violinist with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. As a child, he underwent 24 operations to remove an abscess in his throat.
Pell received his early education at Loreto Convent and at St. Patrick's College, both in his native Ballarat. One of his classmates at St Patrick's was Paul Bongiorno. At St Patrick's, Pell played as a ruckman on the first XVIII from 1956 to 1959. He even signed to play with the Richmond Football Club. However, his ambitions later turned to the priesthood. Speaking of his decision to become a priest, Pell once said, "To put it crudely, I feared and suspected and eventually became convinced that God wanted me to do His work, and I was never able to successfully escape that conviction."
In 1960, he began his priestly studies at Corpus Christi College, then located in Werribee. One of his fellow seminarians at Corpus Christi was Denis Hart, Pell's future successor as Archbishop of Melbourne. Pell continued to play football and served as class prefect in his second and third years. In 1963, he was assigned to continue his studies at the Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome. He was ordained to the diaconate on 15 August 1966.
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