Pope should meet with survivors: Pyne

A senior federal government minister hopes Ballarat child sexual abuse survivors get an audience with the Pope, after they met with Cardinal George Pell in Rome.

Frontbencher Christopher Pyne has also praised the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, set up by the Gillard Labor government, for putting the suffering of survivors on the national agenda.

"I hope they get an audience with the Pope," Mr Pyne told Nine Network on Friday.

"This is a very awful part of our society, which we have to face up to, and I think it's good the royal commission has put these issues on the agenda."

Mr Pyne also expressed hope the commission hearings would give survivors some closure on their "terrible experiences".

Cardinal Pell this week gave almost 20 hours of evidence to the commission about child sexual abuse by pedophile Catholic priests in Ballarat in the 1970s and 1980s.

Survivors believe the cardinal, who was a junior clergyman during this period when multiple children were abused, knew more about what was happening than he let on and didn't act to stop the crimes.

Cardinal Pell has denied this.

Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese said the cardinal's testimony was disappointing and disturbing for the survivors.

"The Catholic Church needs to come out and just say sorry, and make recompense and show a lot more humility than we have seen up to this point," he told Nine Network.

A meeting in Rome overnight between Cardinal Pell and abuse survivors ended with Australia's highest ranking Catholic churchman promising to work with the Ballarat community to set up a centre to support victims.