Tuesday, February 16, 2010

When Irish Eyes aren't Smiling

"Tens of thousands of Irish children were sexually, physically and emotionally abused by nuns, priests and others over 60 years in a network of (Roman Catholic) church-run residential schools meant to care for the poor, the vulnerable and the unwanted, according to a report released in Dublin," read the New York Times report. The article went on to say many of these kids had committed no crime but to be born into a family with an alcoholic or mentally ill parent, or, gasp, an 'unwed mother.' Priests coerced families into placing their children into these facilities, where they were forced to work long hours and tormented during their down time.

The Church, of course, is sorry. Again, they are sorry for raping, sodomizing, and molesting, as well as beating and humiliating, the children and young people entrusted to their care.

Oh my God. How long are people going to allow this world-wide pedophile ring to operate without restriction, without answering to anybody unless they happen to feel like it? In what countries does the Roman Catholic Church operate orphanages and youth facilities today? Who is watching? Who is holding them accountable? How long will society allow them to hide behind the cloak of religious liberty and refuse to investigate them the way they would investigate any other organization?

The pope is planning to visit Irish bishops, no doubt planning strategy. If the Irish government and people lap up his forthcoming apology without demanding justice from the government, I hear there is some property for coming up for sale across the pond in Brooklyn they just might be interested in. Not that we've done any better over here. A number of known criminals who protected pedophiles, such as Roger Mahaney in California, are still out there, roaming free while victims continue to suffer because of their actions.

We need the collective governments of the world to quit kowtowing to these people and start holding them responsible for their actions.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Hail to the Chief!

This shouldn't be big news, but it is. In Wisconsin, Eau de Claire Police Chief Jerry Matysik contacted his state legislators to inform them Archbishop Jerome Listecki was not truthful with them when he testified about church procedure for dealing with sexual abuse. Listecki, now in Milwaukee but formerly in the La Crosse diocese, has had a policy in place stating sexual assault victims should contact the church instead of directing them to inform law enforcement.

How's that policy been working so far? Well, not too bad if the goal is to keep sexual assault hush-hush and protect perpetrators, but if you want to assist victims, bring perpetrators to justice, and prevent more young people from being victimized, it's not doing all that well.

It took a lot of courage for Chief Matysik to bring this out in the open the way he did. Far too many law enforcement agencies are still dragging their feet when it comes to dealing with clergy sexual abuse, and it really did my heart good to read about this man's actions. In any civil rights movement, nothing really changes until those not directly affected by injustice are willing to stand with those who are. Women did not get the vote until men voted to allow it. African-Americans' rights were denied until whites joined the cause. And victims alone will not be able to end the scourge of sexual abuse.

We need others who are willing to stand in solidarity with us, people who are in a position to effect real change. We need people like Chief Matsysik. Follow the first link to read the story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Then follow the second to find the chief's contact information, and call him up to say thank you, and let him know what this means to survivors.

http://www.jsonline.com/features/religion/83585862.html/

http://www.eauclairewi.gov/police-home/

Monday, February 8, 2010

Denial in the pews perpetuates abuse crisis

Awhile back the Des Moines Register published an article entitled "Americans switch religions early and often, survey finds." The article is based on interviews with 2,800 people from a Pew survey. According to the survey, the Catholic church has experienced the greatest net loss. Their reasons for leaving: six in 10 left because of disssatisfaction with Catholic teachings on abortion and homosexuality. Half left because of concerns over teachings on birth control, and 4 in 10 left because of Catholicism's treatment of women. Fewer than three in 10 left because of the clergy sexual assault crisis.

I really don't understand this mindset, but it's consistent with what I've seen. There are grumblings, there are jokes, there are a few nasty e-mails fired off to the bishops' offices now and then, but I've only met one person, other than survivors and our families, who have left because of the sexual abuse. And those who've stayed seem equally untouched by the abuse, if you'll pardon the terrible pun.

As one of the many survivors of sexual assault by Patrick McElliott of the Archdiocese of Dubuque, I received through litigation the right to speak at the place I was assaulted, The American Martyrs Retreat House by Cedar Falls. I chose to speak on a weekend they were holding a meeting of archdiocesan lay leaders. I wanted them to know the impact of the assault and how the complicity of the community directly led to my assault. My husband and I drove over there, a ninety minute drive, and met with Iowa SNAP leader, Steve Theissen. (SNAP is Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests: it's a support group for people who were abused by any religious leader.) We sat in a waiting room while the people were in Mass. Archbishop Jerome Hanus announced to the people a survivor was going to speak immediately following the service. People filed out and into the waiting room to get a cup of coffee. A few smiled at us, some glared, but most acted as if we were not there.

When I went into the chapel to speak, the six or seven nuns in attendance stayed to hear me, along with the Archbishop and Vicar General. One lay person stayed. One. The rest went off to their meetings, presumably some of which touched on social justice ministries. At the time I was focused on telling my story and reclaiming my voice, which I literally lost during and on occassion after the assault. But as time moved on, I was increasingly aware of how detached most Catholic people seem from the abuse crisis. This disconnect has been a factor in the clergy abuse crisis all along.

During my years in Catholic high school in the 70s, there was a priest whom other priests warned the girls to stay away from. He later moved to another town where he was charged with assaulting a 13-year-old girl. Her parents ended up dropping the charges because they didn't want her to have to go to court. A woman in this same town filed a civil suit against the priest for assaulting her; the suit was dropped on a technicality. My friend was assaulted by a priest at Dowling who was a well-known abuser of boys. The priest went on to serve in other communities, in spite of the fact that my friend was awarded a settlement and received a letter of apology. The priest is retired and living in Des Moines.

I could go on ad nauseum about case after case after case. My question is why? Why the disconnect, this apparent lack of compassion or even concern among the Catholic people? I'm reminded of a section in the Steven King novel Firestarter, where the main character has the ability to "push" people to believe whatever he wants them to believe. He's at a gas station where he had to kill rogue CIA agents who were trying to capture him and study his psychic power, and a group of people were looking on, horrified. He told them, "This doesn't concern you. Nothing happened," and gave a mental push, and the people all went back to what they were doing, oblivious to the dead bodies in their midst.

That is what the average Catholic's response to the clergy abuse crisis looks like. There are hundreds of thousands of victims in the United States alone, from virtually every diocese, children and young people who were raped, sodomized and sexually assaulted, whose lives were cruelly altered by the abuse, and yet the average Catholic doesn't seem to think it concerns them in the slightest. "Nothing happened." I am not expecting everybody to leave the Church, but I would have thought more of those who did, would have done so at least partially because of the organized pedophilia.

Friday, February 5, 2010

I'm Telling

Following a July 2008 telephone confrontation

The Roman Catholic Church insists it is committed to resolving the clergy abuse crisis, but their actions belie their words. Recently I called Monsignor John Hyland, the vicar general of the Diocese of Davenport, to express my concern about a priest who works in that diocese. The conversation ended fairly amicably, although with the usual denial and fact-shifting one comes to expect when dealing with the RCC.

The next conversation, however, did not have a happy ending. I had called on another matter- to ask why the people who ran the retreat for sexual assault survivors held at the American Martyrs Retreat House in Cedar Falls were not informed that at least one person had been sexually assaulted at the retreat house. I didn't feel my question was answered to my satisfaction, but I also didn't feel any animosity until Monsignor Hyland brought up our previous conversation.

He totally reversed the concept of confidentiality, which is supposed to protect victims, by telling me I had to keep the information about the priest quiet. He said the person who had told me about the priest in the first place was angry that I had reported him, and he said, in an intimidating tone, "You could get into alot of trouble."

At which point I fired back. I knew if I let him steamroller me, I would have a hell of a time recovering, so I didn't allow him to verbally beat me up. I told him I didn't give a crap about that, I cared about the boys that could get hurt. I said that is how I got raped, because of the Catholic church's secrecy and their tendency to protect the perp, not the young people.

I ended up hanging up on him, which felt pretty good. But I had a really rough week or so of triggers and flashbacks, brought on by Monsignor Hyland's intimidating tone.

That's why I'm writing this: to honor my inner 20-year-old, that dear young girl who was terrorized, intimidated and raped by a Roman Catholic priest, Father Patrick McElliot. To let her know I now have the ability to protect her. To use the one tool I have, the only one I need: my voice.

I'm not that frightened young girl anymore. I'm all grown up and I'm mad as hell. I'm telling.

Undo the Heavy Burdens

I gave this sermon at my church, St. Olaf Lutheran Church in Fort Dodge,Iowa, in July of 2007. I was very proud of our pastor, David Grindberg, for asking me to do this, and of the people in the church for their openness to receive it.

God, May the meditations of our hearts and the words of our mouths by pleasing to you.

Many of you know I had a book published a few months ago. Pastor Dave was nice enough to put that in the bulletin and mention it from the pulpit back in May, and inform people they can buy it in the office here, and when I was walking out of church, I shook his hand and thanked him, and then he said, “Do you want to preach?”

And I said, “What???”

But then I thought about it and realized it might be God calling, because when God works, it is through people.

One of the things I have always valued about St. Olaf is the way the people here truly treasure the children of the church and work to make each one know how God also treasures them. We also extend this care to children who are not a part of St. Olaf’s church family, as evidenced by our missions to Nicaragua and other outreach programs. Because of our love for children, I ask you to join with me in facing a serious problem that unfortunately affects so many children, so many families, and ultimately, all of us.

Unless something changes, one of every four girls born today in the United States will be sexually abused before her 18th birthday. Over the course of her lifetime, she is more than twice as likely to be sexually abused as she is to develop breast cancer. For boys, the numbers are not much better: it’s estimated that one in six boys will also be sexually abused by the time they’re 18. Because so few cases are reported to police or other authorities, accurate numbers are hard to come by, and many experts in the field believe the true number of sexual abuse victims is even higher. And, of course, it’s not only children who are sexually abused, but adults even up into their 80s and 90s are victimized. Sexual abuse is a problem that affects people of all classes, colors, and creeds. The old adage that parents taught their children, don’t talk to strangers, is of little help, because 80 to 90% of children who are sexually abused, are abused by someone they know and trust, and the number is similar for adult victims.

While we can’t be sure how many people have suffered from sexual abuse, we do know a great deal about the consequences. The cost is heavy for victims, families and society at large. Sexual abuse victims are more prone to drug and alcohol abuse, suicide, depression and other mental illnesses. I know, for I have experienced some of these consequences myself. As many of you know, I “came out” as a sexual abuse survivor after my book Blind Faith was published last spring.

Abuse causes people to believe that they are damaged, that they are less than others. Sexual abuse in particular strikes at a person’s soul, leaving deep wounds, which, just like a wound in the flesh, will fester until treated. When I began to deal with the fact that I had been sexually abused as a child and again at age 20, I felt so contaminated that I truly believed that my family would be better off if I were not here- that the morally correct choice would be for me to leave them- one way or the other. Such feelings of shame and pain are common to sexual abuse survivors in our culture. A dear friend’s prayers gave me the strength to look for help, and I took the first steps on my road to healing.

But you can’t get help unless you can talk about it, and you can’t talk about it when society still so often does not want to hear. According to children’s rights advocate, attorney Marci Hamilton, “The last true frontier in civil rights in the United States is that of children’s rights. It is our country’s ugly secret that massive numbers of children are abused. Yet the law has been excruciatingly slow both in stopping ongoing abuse, and in deterring abuse before it happens,” she concluded.

All the stories in Scripture that tell how Jesus interacted with children show His gentle spirit and his great love. While his love extends to everyone, we also remember His words warning those who bring harm to the innocent. In Luke 17: 1-2, Jesus said, “It is impossible that no offenses should come, but woe to him through whom they come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.”

What is the Christian response, then, to the problem of sexual abuse? We can all ask the Holy Spirit and listen for that small still voice within to lead us into the action that God would have us take. We all lead busy lives and there are many important issues begging for our attention, but if you feel led to action in this area, here are a few ways to help end the scourge of sexual abuse.
In many states, all citizens are mandatory reporters of child abuse. It troubled me deeply when I read a story in Newsweek magazine a few months ago about a neighbor of the man in Missouri who kidnapped and sexually assaulted two young boys. The neighbor had heard cries, screams and pleading for the man to stop, yet had done nothing. I think all citizens should be mandatory reporters of child abuse. We could also eliminate the statute of limitations for sexual abuse of children, for it often takes years for a child to feel safe enough to tell someone, and by then it’s too late to hold the offender accountable. Parents need to talk to their children, and even more importantly, we need to listen and BELIEVE them.

We can press for more funding for alcohol and drug treatment. Alcohol is a major factor in many child sex abuse cases, so funding treatment programs could go a long ways toward reducing the number of victims. Also, many victims turn to alcohol and illegal drugs to deal with their pain, so treatment for them may be a first step in healing. We can, and must, provide better mental health services.

I was one of the fortunate ones. When I became severely depressed, I had good insurance coverage and a loving, supportive husband that enabled me to receive all the help I needed, but for many people, mental health treatment is totally unavailable. Most sexual abuse victims need mental health services in order to recover, and we can work to make that available for everyone.
We can also provide a listening ear for those people in our lives who have been victimized. And we all have people in our lives who have been- maybe the woman in the next cubicle at work, the man you work with in a service organization, or the child in your Sunday school class. In Isaiah 58:6, God calls us “to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free.” It is not easy to hear about another’s abuse. It is painful for the listener—but how much more for those who have experienced it, and how isolating when they have no one to share their pain with. When we can truly listen to another person’s pain and enter into their suffering, we can indeed undo their heavy burden. When we can listen and allow them to fully express their pain, without asking a lot of questions or judging them, we do indeed loose the bonds of wickedness and set the oppressed free.

As Christians, we know we are saved by grace and that no one is beyond the reach of God’s love. As Christians, we must ask ourselves what our response should be to the offender. When I was struggling to deal with the fact that my father had sexually abused me when I was a small child, I also struggled with how God could have allowed it. We believe that God is our father, and that a father protects his children. One day I was praying and I said to God, “If I had seen somebody molesting one of my children, I would have stopped them. Why didn’t you?” And I heard the small still voice within reply. He said, “You were both my children.” Even those who commit the most heinous actions are still, to God, his beloved children.

Although we are saved by grace, it is not, as Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoffer pointed out, a cheap grace. God is offended by sin, and so must we be. We can’t afford to let offenders off easy. We have to protect the children and provide justice to all who have been grievously wounded. But perhaps some in the church will be called to develop ways to effectively minister to those who are “least among us,” knowing that many people who sexually abuse others are, themselves, very damaged individuals, and knowing that they, too, have loved ones who need compassion. In Isaiah 42:3, we read that Jesus’ love is so tender and all encompassing that “a bruised reed He will not break.” We can ask God to help us emulate his love. I thank you for joining with me in reflecting on this difficult topic.

Every two minutes in the United States, someone is sexually abused. That means that in the time it took for me to deliver this sermon, five people were sexually abused. At least three of them were children. Would you please join me for a moment of silent prayer for all who suffer from abuse?

Dear Jesus, we ask that you change our hearts and minds so we can find solutions to the problem of sexual abuse. We ask your healing for all who have been wounded, in your mighty name. Amen.

Oprah for Pope!

Oprah models transparency, responsibility in her handling of the crisis at her school.

It must have seemed like a bad dream. For beloved talk show host Oprah Winfrey, starting a school for girls in poverty-stricken South Africa was her greatest achievement, a dream come true. But the dream morphed into a nightmare when she received the word that students had been sexually abused by a dorm matron at the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls.
For Oprah, herself a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, the news was devastating. But she made no attempt to hide the abuse nor her emotional reaction to the news: she tells of her response in the January issue of O, The Oprah Magazine.

"Many years ago, Betty Rollin wrote a book about breast cancer called First, You Cry," Oprah wrote. "That rule must apply to other crises, too, because that's exactly what I did, pacing from room to room in heaving sobs. It felt like my heart was splitting."

Maybe that's the difference. Maybe that's why Oprah's handling of the sexual abuse crisis at her girls' school was so many light years away from the reactions of the Catholic hierarchy to the abuse of the children they were responsible for. Somehow I have a hard time picturing any of the prelates giving themselves over to grief the way Oprah did, the way any feeling person would. Oprah allowed herself to experience what the Bible refers to as "genuine sorrow that leads to repentance (change)." So instead of trying to cover it up, buy the victims off, blame them and then say, well, that's all over, time to move on, folks, Oprah allowed herself to feel her own disappointment, as well as entering into the pain of the victims, a pain she is intimately acquainted with.

But Oprah didn't stop there. First she cried, then she acted. She called in some of the country's best experts in child trauma and developed an action plan, then took off for South Africa. She headed an investigation into the charges, provided a psychological team to offer support for the girls, and is developing a new educational team.

Oh, I'm sure she has a legal team assembled, as well. You don't get to where Oprah has gotten without protecting your assets, and no doubt she had that base covered, too. But the Catholic Church could take a page from Oprah's script: it may have happened somewhere, sometime, but I have never heard of the Catholic Church bringing in trauma experts of their own volition, certainly not prior to their public humiliation in 2002. I have never heard of the Catholic Church hierarchy personally calling victims and their families to extend their concern. I have certainly never heard of any cardinals or bishops or popes entering into the suffering of their many, many victims the way Oprah did.

That's why, the next time the cardinals gather to choose a new leader, I say, think outside the box. Stedman may not go for it, but I think it's a great idea, one who's time had come: Oprah for Pope!

Church's sympathy for victims is "strained"

A letter I wrote to the Catholic Messenger, the newsletter of the Davenport, Iowa, diocese, in response to an article that was referenced in the Cedar Rapids Gazette, which indicated the church's sympathy for victims was becoming "strained."

I am writing regarding your editorial, Light at the End of the Tunnel, which was quoted in the Cedar Rapids Gazette. After I read the Gazette article, I fired off some angry e-mails to the Messenger, but later that evening Father David Hitch of Tipton sent me the entire editorial and I wanted to make a more thoughtful reply.

I am a survivor of sexual abuse by a priest. Therefore, when I read the quotation in the Gazette stating that your sympathy is “strained,” I was enraged. I have had time to process your entire editorial and would like to respond to two main points: the role the average Catholic played in creating this crisis (not scandal, please, but crisis), and the likelihood of its resolution.

While many Catholics were completely shocked by the revelations of priests sexually abusing children and young people, there is no way this could have happened without the complicity of a good number of ordinary Catholics. Patrick McElliott, the priest who assaulted me in 1979, had been sexually abusing females since at least 1946, we know through court documents. When he was in Waterloo in 1963, he sexually abused a girl, her family went to the bishop’s office, and they were threatened with excommunication if they talked about it. McElliott abused several other girls in Waterloo, and the archbishop sent him for treatment for alcoholism, then transferred him to another church in the archdiocese of Dubuque, where he abused more girls, and the cycle was repeated again and again.

How big of an area is the archdiocese of Dubuque? Do you honestly believe it is possible that, when a priest was transferred to a new church, nobody had friends or relatives that had heard of the priest’s habits? I know our culture didn’t like to talk about sexual abuse- and it sounds like you would like a return to that reticence- but I can’t believe that nobody knew. I think many people knew and warned the girls in their circle to keep away from him. I think, as long as it wasn’t happening to their own kids (and sometimes even when it did), people were perfectly willing to turn a blind eye and a deaf ear rather than rock the boat. I believe housekeepers, fellow clergy members, and others had to know about at least some of the abuse.

Regarding the light at the end of the tunnel: I sincerely wish that were true, that you were nearing that point. I wish you could just focus on the good things you want to do. (I wish that for myself, also, but unfortunately, I think I will probably struggle with some of the effects of this until the day I die.) But I don’t think you are anywhere near that point. Until ordinary Catholics look at the root causes of the crisis and decide to do something about it, not only will it not go away, but it will continue and more children and vulnerable adults will be the victims of sex crimes by priests.

When I began to deal with my abuse, I learned about two doctrines every Catholic should know, but I doubt most have ever heard of: Criminel Solicitations and Mental Reservation. Criminel Solicitations details how bishops are to handle it when priests sexually abuse children or adults. It centers around keeping everybody quiet, and tells the bishops they can threaten witnesses and victims with excommunication to enforce their silence. This is so evil I can hardly believe it, but it’s true. What victims need is the freedom to talk, to release their pain, not to make them choose between their faith and their healing. Mental Reservation, in essence, gives bishops and cardinals the right to lie in order to prevent the church from looking bad. I would urge you to learn more about these doctrines.

I will believe the Catholic church is sorry for the pain they have caused when I see the Pope publicly repudiate these damaging doctrines and ask forgiveness for all the harm they have caused.

I will believe that children and vulnerable adults are safe from the sexual abuse that I suffered when I see significant change in the Catholic church: an end to celibacy requirements, women accepted in the priesthood, and the sharing of power with laity. I quit the Catholic church years ago, but I wish I would see these changes because they would make sexual abuse less likely to flourish. Unfortunately, the culture of the church has only become more secretive since the 2002 revelations.

You may decry the release of the documents in LA, but I know as a survivor how very helpful it was to learn, through my attorney, the background of the priest who assaulted me. It helped my healing process to learn that there was nothing in particular about me that “caused” a holy priest to assault me, that it was, for him, pretty much a normal day.

I hope the Catholic church will heal so that more people won’t be sexually abused. But that will only happen if individual Catholics like yourself step up and hold the bishops, cardinals and pope responsible. Only then will you see that light at the end of the tunnel.

Sincerely,

Janet Clark

Because it's not over

Finally. A place to get it all together. Break the Silence is where I'm going to post all the various blogs and articles I've written about Roman Catholic clergy abuse and other sexual abuse issues and have them in one place. And, because it's not over, I'll be adding new material way more often than I'd like.

If you ask almost any member of the church hierarchy, they will tell you the same thing: the clergy abuse crisis is over. (Except they won't use the word crisis, they will say scandal, which is far too mild a word to describe the criminal behavior which they covered up and enabled for so many years.) If that were the case, I would not keep hearing from victims. New victims whose abuse occurred just a few years ago, older victims who know full well what the repurcussions will be if they come forward: blame, shame and disbelief from far too many of the people who should be embracing them and anointing their wounds with tears, as Christ would do.

If that were the case, diocese around the country would not keep fighting the release of documents. They would not spend thousands of dollars paying attorneys to keep their dirty little secrets from reaching the public. They would welcome the Holy Spirit cleansing fire instead of continuing their futile efforts to hold it back. We would not keep hearing the same old story breaking in Ireland, in Canada, around the globe: survivors find the strength to come forward and are met with cruelty and resistance time and time again.

Because it's not over.