Troubadour, April 2010
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The Pandemic of Sexual Abuse
by Robert Fontana
In a strange sort of irony, given the reports of clergy sex abuse sweeping across Europe, the Catholic bishops of the United States have designated April to be Sexual Abuse Awareness Month. In truth, the most likely place for a child to be abused is in the home, not the Church. One in four girls and one in five boys in the United States have been sexually abused before reaching their 18th birthday. The abuser is usually a family member, very often a step-parent. In fact, abuse by step-parents, mostly dads, is so prevalent that simply having a step-parent raises the probability that a child will be abused. I have written much about sex abuse in the Church, but this is simply part of a larger pandemic of sexual abuse in society. To make this point, I asked a good friend, Rosie Perez, to share in this issue of The Troubadour her story of being molested by her father.
For those of you reading this and who have been abused, if you have never told your story nor received help to face the trauma of what happened to you, it is NOT TOO LATE! Tell a friend, speak to a counselor, or call your trusted minister. My brother, who was abused as a 10-year-old, kept this awful secret to himself until he was in his mid-40s. His shame was so great, in part, because he blamed himself for what happened. When he finally told the story of his abuse to our family, an older brother said, “You, a 45-year-old man, has to stop blaming you, a 10-year-old boy, for what happened. It was not your fault but the fault of the man who abused you.” My brother who was abused began to weep uncontrollably. By telling his story he could begin to dispel the lie that he had come to believe: that somehow he was responsible for what happened!
If your abuser is still alive, consider reporting the abuse to police or Child Protective Services, even if it is a family member. HE OR SHE MAY STILL BE A RISK TO CHILDREN. You may be saving the life of a child by reporting the abuse.
If your abuser was a family member and has died, discuss with a counselor the wisdom of reporting the abuse to family and friends who may also have been victimized.
It is very important to report abuse by clergy, Scout leaders, teachers, coaches and other professionals who may have died so that their names can be made public. It is most likely that you were not the only person abused. A public notice, picture in the local paper, and story of the abuse is extremely helpful in encouraging other victims to come forward. In fact, it was a story in the local newspaper about now-deceased Fr. Francis Duffy, having molested a comatose woman to whom he was supposed to be administering the anointing of the sick, which prompted another of his victims, Kim Alarid, to call me for help.
Kim was sexually molested and raped from the time she was six years old until she was 13 by the now-deceased Duffy. Duffy molested Kim in the confessional, in his car, and even in her own house while she was recovering from an accident.
Kim was an alcoholic and drug addict from the time that she was ten until shortly before she died of systemic scleroderma at the age of 40. That was when I had met her and learned of her story. Duffy died in the early 1990s, but the evil that he inflicted on Kim destroyed her life. And it also devastated the life of her mother and siblings, and the lives of Kim’s children and grandchildren who had no knowledge of the abuse or of the trauma that was behind Kim’s self-destructive behavior. The effect of sex abuse crosses generations.
Even if your abuser is dead, I urge you to tell your story to someone you trust!
Some of you may have been sexually molested by a clergyman, doctor, or counselor as an adult. I have heard numerous stories of a distraught woman going to counseling over a failing marriage only to have the counselor take advantage of her emotional state and molest her. A male friend of mine had something similar happen to him when he confessed to a priest for the first time to having homosexual feelings. The priest listened compassionately and manipulated my friend into a sexual relationship.
Sexual molestation of vulnerable adults by health care and clergy professionals is also an epidemic that must be stopped. If this has happened to you, call the police, a lawyer, or talk to someone you trust and tell your story. YOU ARE NOT AT FAULT FOR BEING MANIPULATED BY A SKILLED SEXUAL PREDATOR WHILE YOU WERE IN SUCH A VULNERABLE STATE!
As always, please let me hear from you what you think of these articles. And if you have been abused and want to tell your story, send it in and we will consider printing it. I can think of no better way to break the silence around sexual abuse of children, teens, and vulnerable adults than by having victims of such abuse tell their stories.
The truth, as Jesus once said, shall set us free! Easter blessings!
A Scared Little Girl – My Story of Sexual Abuse
by Rosie Perez,
My name is Rosie Perez. I want to share about my life from the time I was a little girl until where I am today at 61 years old. As my life started off, I didn’t know what love was. I was sexually abused by my father, and I was always a scared little girl, always felt alone, and I was always threatened that if I told anybody about the abuse, then nobody would like me and I would be in a lot of trouble.
My mom knew about the abuse, but she never did anything about it. She always kind of blamed me, and she treated me badly. When I got married, the abuse stopped because I left home. My mom believed that Eddie (my husband) didn’t know anything about my past abuse. So she often told me that if I didn’t do this or that for her, she would tell Eddie. I carried this with me for many, many years.
One day, I went to a Cursillo (a retreat), and that was the first time deep inside that I brought in Jesus and Mother Mary. I remember kneeling there and trying to talk to Jesus, because I didn’t know how to go about it, but the people with me said, “Just talk to him; he’s your best friend.” So I did. I began to understand that Jesus loved me so much.
After I made my Cursillo in 1970, I had all my four children. I had never really known how bad it was to hold all my feelings inside. There was so much sadness in me that it was making me sick. When my youngest boy, Robert, was a just a baby, I went into town. As I stood on a corner, I looked around, feeling lost. I seemed to not know where I was. But in his great love, Jesus directed me to a building that I saw across the street.
The building was a counseling place, and I went in there and told the lady, “I need help.” Talking to her and another lady, it was the first time I ever shared the truth about my life, and how I felt so, so dirty deep inside, even though my husband loved me so much and I had four children whom I loved.
But I felt that loneliness inside, and I talked and talked, until finally one of the women said, “Does your husband know about what you lived through with your mom and dad and what your father did?” When I said that he didn’t know, they both said to me, “It’s time for you to break the silence and tell your husband.”
I remember saying, “If I tell him, he’s going to leave me, and take all my four babies,” and I just cried and cried because I loved my kids so much. I kept repeating, “I’m no good; he’s going to take them.”
Later, I thought, “Well, if he takes my babies, let it be then.” I kept going for counseling, and finally I decided to tell my husband. I felt like a little, little girl. I put all my kids down to bed and kept crying, as I stood by the window.
My husband kept asking me, “What’s wrong, honey? What’s wrong with you?”
I said, “I’ll tell you later.”
I finally got into bed, and I just kept crying and crying. My husband kept asking me, “What’s wrong?”
I looked at him and said, “If you want to take all my four kids and leave me, that’s okay, because I’m not worthy of anything.” Then I told him about what my dad had done to me and how my mom treated me.
My husband pulled me close. He put his arms around me and said, “You’re not to blame. You were young. And you were scared. I love you so much, and I’m not taking the kids, and I’m not leaving you. I was thinking that you were going to tell me there was another man in your life.”
I looked at him and said, “No.” Then my husband just held me while I cried.
That was the first step that I took in my life to be able to talk about my past. When I returned to the counselor, she asked if I had told my husband.
When I said I had, she asked, “How did it make you feel?”
I said, “It made me feel a lot better.”
Some time later, my mom asked me to do something for her, to buy my brother a coat. I replied, “Well, Mom, why can’t you buy it?”
She said, “No, I want you to buy it.” But in my heart, I didn’t want to do this for my mom. I shared this with my counselor.
“Well, then,” the counselor said, “You need to tell your mother. You need to tell your mom that your husband knows all about your dad’s abuse, so she can stop blackmailing you. And you have to do this to start being set free.” I think Jesus knew what I needed to do. Very soon after, I went to visit my mom and dad—they were home all alone.
I looked at my dad and told him, “Dad, I forgive you for what you’ve done to me.” Then I turned around to my mom. “Mom, I forgive you for what you’ve done to me. And Eddie knows all about it now.”
As I walked away, I felt free; I felt so good. I did not hate my mom and dad. I ended up forgiving my mom and dad; and they just kept on being my mom and dad. My mom was an alcoholic. She was in and out of jail. As I learned more, I went to Al-Anon to help me understand my mother. I ended up understanding my mom so much, that I forgave her for everything, for all the ways she had hurt me, because she was sick. Eventually, my mom had a bad stroke, and a few days later she died. But I had forgiven my mom.
Then my dad got sick. We couldn’t take care of him and had to put him in the nursing home. I visited him every day. With his cancer, he got skinnier and skinnier. He would soil his pants, and I would clean him and wipe him. But I forgave my dad, because I knew that Jesus was the one that was going to judge him, not me. At the end, I was there for my dad. One thing I always wanted was for my dad to tell me that he was sorry before he died. But he never did. He never told me he was sorry. But in my heart I knew that the Lord was going to take care of him, not me.
I believe that all the trials, the heartaches, and the sadness that I’ve gone through have made me who I am today. I love Jesus and Mother Mary. I have done a lot of good. I taught CCD. I take communion out to the sick and the dying. I go visit the nursing home. I do things that the Lord wants me to do, and I am happy inside. But I am happy because I have Jesus in my life. Jesus is the center of my life.
Now I’m 61 years old, and I’m content. The Lord has blessed me. I’ve had more good in my life than bad. I am so blessed with all my kids, my grandkids, and the people that love me for who I am. My life is just so beautiful. I am happy about the person that I am today. Everything that I’ve gone through in my life—I know there was a reason for it. And I am happy. To me, when you have Jesus in your life, you can move mountains. My heart is full of peace and happiness because of Jesus and Mother Mary. I thank you all. May God bless everyone in the world, even my enemies. My hope is that this story will help someone else.
You cannot change what you do not love; Easter, the Pope, and Vatican Council III
by Robert Fontana
The tsunami of clergy sex abuse that is spreading across Europe has now reached the Vatican and is threatening to swallow up the pope, however unfair some of the complaints against him may be. This “tsunami,” it seems, will continue to spread to all Catholic countries in Central and South America and the Philippines, and the Asian and African Catholic communities until the worldwide phenomenon of clergy sex abuse is fully exposed! And that is what needs to happen: every credible case of sex abuse by a priest, deacon, sister, brother or lay minister must be made public. Pope Benedict, who is as good a man as any to hold the office, ought to release to the public all secret files in the Vatican dealing with sex abuse and order every diocese in the country to do the same. But will the Church change?
Cardinal Francis George, the archbishop of Chicago, in his book, The Difference God Makes, wrote that we cannot change what we do not love. He is referring to American culture: “A culture is transformed by those who love it.” I think he is right. We might apply the same truth to the Church: A church is transformed by those who love it. Those who hate the Church may seek to destroy it or even make it pay for all the trauma of abuse that it has caused. But only those who love it can transform it into a Church that is more faithful, honest, and humble.
I love the Catholic Church, that is, I love that community of faith rooted in the apostolic witness that has handed on to me:
- faith in a loving and just God who is Trinity;
- the Gospels and New Testament writings;
- a culture of life and love rooted in human dignity and the right to life;
- the examples of saints from all walks of life;
- an intellectual tradition that intersects faith and reason;
- a Sacramental world view that sees nature imbued with grace;
- a liturgical year that helps ground our busyness in the paschal mystery;
- a public faith that must embrace social justice and service to the poor;
- the Eucharist and Sacraments; and
- the priesthood, men set apart, in all their gifts and limitations, to stand in the place of Jesus when the Church gathers for worship and Sacraments.
Many of you readers love the Church as I do, and with me want to help transform this community of faith by loving it with all the demands that love makes on any committed relationship: truth, transparency, clear communication, apologies, forgiveness, and changed behavior. AND IT IS PAST TIME THAT THOSE WHO LOVE THE CHURCH STEP INTO THE MESSY WORK OF TRANSFORMING IT FROM WITH IN.
This will not be easy. We face colossal problems — some structural, many attitudinal — which have turned the Church into the Anti-Christ for many children, now adults, who were raped, sodomized, fondled, threatened, beaten, and spiritually imprisoned by pedophiles masquerading as ministers. Is that too harsh? Ask the little girl, a boarder at the Catholic Indian School, who was dangled from a belfry or the boy from a Catholic parish who had a gun thrust into his mouth—as they were warned not to tell about the abuse the cleric had done to them. They had better keep “their secret” or else!
We Catholics who want to love the Church into transformation must first deal with certain attitudes that we carry that prevented us from getting involved when we first learned of sexual abuse by clerics. Easter is a good time of the year for an attitude adjustment.
Easter reminds us that God is our hope —not the pope or even the Holy Roman Catholic Church. We proclaim Jesus and God’s reign, not the Church’s reign. The Church is a servant to the Kingdom, but it is not the Kingdom and does not get our unquestioned allegiance and loyalty… but God does.
Because of Easter, because of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, we can trust that God will lead us, all of us, not just the pope and bishops, through this crisis to a resurrected Church. Please hear me, I am not knocking the ministry of the pope and bishops, but the Holy Spirit is leading all of us to be part of the solution to this crisis—not just the hierarchy.
The days of the honor system and blind trust in Church leadership must be put to rest. Catholics, who were taught not to question their faith or their leaders, must begin to do both; the former for understanding, the latter for accountability.
Active Catholics, conservatives, liberals, and in-betweens, must get active in being part of the solution!
Easter is also a good time to turn to the “whole Church” for the structural changes that are needed, not just to its clerical leaders. Each diocese needs to call together a council of all active Catholics, clergy and lay, young and old, men and women to address the sexual abuse crisis and propose a way through it. Such a council must:
- meet with and listen to victims of sex abuse and their families as they tell their stories, and learn from them how we might be reconciled;
- study the history of cover-up of sex abuse by diocesan officials;
- learn from experts on how to prevent future abuse and cover-up of that abuse; and
- propose specific structural, doctrinal, and policy changes that would be taken by elected delegation to a national council.
The national council would be a precursor to an international gathering in Rome: Vatican Council III.
Yes, a crisis of this magnitude demands the convocation of Vatican Council III, with representatives from the entire Church, men and women, clergy and lay from every nation on earth.
Vatican Council III, built from the ground up, would have full authority to make the necessary changes in Church doctrine, law, and structure to insure that children will never again be sacrificed to protect pedophiles, a bishop’s reputation, or the image of the Church.
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