Gerald Ridsdale, one of Australia's worst pedophile priests, has admitted to 30 new child sex offences.
The charges against the former Catholic priest, who is already serving a long jail sentence for child sex offences, are mainly indecent assault against boys and girls.
The charges to which he pleaded guilty on Monday date to the 1960s and involve a number of victims.
Magistrate Ian Alger struck out another 54 charges against the 79-year-old at the Melbourne Magistrates Court.
When Mr Alger asked Ridsdale if he intended to plead guilty to the charges, he replied: "I really wasn't prepared for this.
"I haven't spoken to my solicitor about what I'm supposed to do today.
"Your honour, I plead guilty. I plead guilty, yes."
Ridsdale was jailed in 1994 for 18 years for offences against 21 victims - 20 boys and one girl - while he was a priest at a number of churches between 1961 and 1982.
He was convicted of further charges in 2006 for offences committed against 10 boys from 1970 to 1987 and was sentenced to a further 13 years.
He became eligible for parole in June.
The church was first approached with a complaint against Ridsdale when he was working in Inglewood in 1975, according to the report of the Victorian inquiry into child abuse, tabled in parliament last week.
This prompted a bishop to move him to a different parish.
A complaint was also made against Ridsdale in Mortlake in 1982 and he later moved to Horsham, where another complainant came forward in 1988.
Ridsdale was also appointed to parishes in Apollo Bay and Edenhope, but complaints from that period were not made to the church until after 1988, the inquiry report said.
The inquiry said the church suspended Ridsdale's priestly duties in 1988 and sent him to the US state of New Mexico for rehabilitation, before he returned to NSW in 1991.
He was laicised from the church in November 1993.
It emerged in the inquiry that bishops in the Ballarat Diocese recognised him as one of the worst offenders in Australia's history.
Ridsdale appeared in court via videolink from prison on Monday.
He will appear in the Victorian County Court on Wednesday for an arraignment and plea hearing.
