From Hurt to Healing

Cardinal Law leaves Rome!

Mona — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 03:18:01 +0000

“The Vatican says the Pope accepted Law’s resignation from Saint Mary Major Basilica.” Did his birthday party upset the leaders in Rome? Was it too much bad press? I would have thought that Rome was immune to bad press by now. But maybe not? Read the whole article here:

http://boston.cbslocal.com/2011/11/21/disgraced-ex-boston-archbishop-cardinal-law-leaves-rome-job/

Penn State vs. the Catholic Church

Mona — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 03:44:39 +0000

In the article quoted below, author Charles P. Pierce – a writer for Esquire and a frequent commentator on NPR - is scathing in his response to Penn State football players praying for the rape victims of Jerry Sandusky. This is something that can’t be prayed away, he suggests. Why? Because the rape of children is too awful. The Penn State scandal has thrown light on yet another institution in which there is a culture of deceit and a cult-like loyalty to “the company” or “the brand.” Victims in the Catholic Church are aware of this kind of culture and of the rewards passed to those who defend it at their expense and at the expense of morality and adherence to civil law. But that other people “get it” came as a surprise to me. The author seems to be a man with a biblical sensibility and a deep understanding of the psychological as well as physical violence of child-rape. He also has an understanding of the hollow and even horrific religious notion that such crimes can be “prayed away.”

Thank you Mr. Pierce.

“The Brutal Truth About Penn State”

The problem can’t be solved by prayer or piety — and it’s far more widespread than we think

By Charles P. Pierce
NOVEMBER 14, 2011

“…The crimes at Penn State are about the raping of children. That is all they are about. The crimes at Penn State are about the raping of children by Jerry Sandusky, and the possibility that people lied to a grand jury about the raping of children by Jerry Sandusky, and the likelihood that most of the people who had the authority at Penn State to stop the raping of children by Jerry Sandusky proved themselves to have the moral backbone of ribbon worms….

There will now be a decade or more of criminal trials, and perhaps a quarter-century or more of civil actions, as a result of what went on at Penn State. These things cannot be prayed away. Let us hear nothing about “closure” or about “moving on.” And God help us, let us not hear a single mumbling word about how football can help the university “heal.” (Lord, let the Alamo Bowl be an instrument of your peace.) This wound should be left open and gaping and raw until the very last of the children that Jerry Sandusky is accused of raping somehow gets whatever modicum of peace and retribution can possibly be granted to him. This wound should be left open and gaping and raw in the bright sunlight where everybody can see it, for years and years and years, until the raped children themselves decide that justice has been done. When they’re done healing — if they’re ever done healing — then they and their families can give Penn State permission to start.”

Anger

Mona — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 15:29:44 +0000

Today I am beside myself with Anger…literally…it stands behind me and demands I write.

My mother knew about one abuser-priest, she admitted as much to my brother, that she had walked in on something in our house, a house we left when I was six.

She knew about the second abuser-priest because she was his victim.

How does a parent do that … know these things and yet expose their child to these men? How? I don’t know how. And then today I read of a couple whose child died with deep open sores under her arms, with feces that had been caked to her bottom so long that skin came off with the diaper – and I know. Parents are capable of horrendous evil, unspeakable crimes against a child, immeasurable depths of denial, at the very same time that they are capable of caring for other children in the family. And I shudder, knowing that my hurt was nothing compared to the pain and horror suffered by this child. And I weep. And my Anger fades inside again.

Cardinal Bernard Law partying in Rome with the “good ol’ boys.”

Mona — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 20:09:09 +0000

Party Boy in Rome

“Who, me?”

VATICAN CITY — (As reported in the Boston Herald on 5 November 2011) Cardinal Bernard Law was treated to a lavish birthday party, the company of high-ranking clerics and even the music of a mariachi band in a four-star Italian hotel. Bernard Law’s guests rolled up in Vatican Mercedes sedans and left singing the praises of the fallen prelate, promoted to his Vatican post after decades of covering up clergy sex abuse back home in Boston….

For the complete post visit blog, Another Voice.

For Boston Globe article click here.

May the Lord Bless You … Mum

Mona — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 20:44:55 +0000

As my mother’s health declines steadily I have been dreaming about her and thinking about her with increasing frequency. I am told she whimpers and cries in her sleep and my heart breaks for her. There was much that she did as a mother that was at the very least inept: she sent me on car trips with a priest who was her rapist. I am a mother and I struggled to find anywhere in my own head for that information to fit. But upon reflection I understand. She was in denial. She had to maintain a very rigid denial, otherwise her whole world would have shattered. She had to hold her husband close and keep the family together. She had to bind us to the Church because her faith was the only source of strength she had. To have admitted to herself or to anyone else the crimes being perpetrated by the two priests in our life would have destroyed everything that was holding her world together. Everything. And she couldn’t risk that.

I have struggled greatly since first finding out about her rapes. But my shock, horror, anger, are fading now, as her life, too, fades. And what I feel is a tender sadness for all that she suffered at the hands of this man, and for all that she endured having to watch her husband’s struggle with his own teenage, then adult, abuser- her Parish Priest. Never telling her husband that she knew, never sharing the horror of her own rapes by the second priest. Both of my parents protecting each other – they thought – both of them engulfed in their own private hell.

And now I remember the little things my mother did for me. The poodle she knitted for me as a child. The Easter nests and Christmas stocking she lovingly prepared. The letters she wrote, the music tapes she shared with me. The prayers and the candles. I am thankful for those memories, and in turn I pray for her:

May the Lord bless you and keep you.
May the Lord look upon you with gentleness and compassion.
May the Lord grant you peace and take you swiftly into His loving arms.

Amnesty International Accuses Catholic Church of Torture

Mona — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 04:17:40 +0000

On Irish Central bloggers have responded to the Amnesty International claim with denial and outrage. But they aren’t, weren’t victims. Here is the response of a victim:

Blood sacrifice

A priest gave me my first orgasm before I was old enough to know my body

A priest tore my vagina with his fingers preparing me for planned penetration

A priest gave me fifty years of recurrent nightmares

A priest ripped my faith from my heart and peace from my mind

This behavior was criminal – physically and spiritually

And I am still treated for Post Traumatic Stress disorder, like a victim of war

My mind is still tortured; my faith is in shreds; my hope has been stolen.

Don’t tell me this wasn’t like torture; isn’t torture.

International Criminal Court in The Hague receives case against Pope

Mona — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 00:59:23 +0000

Abuse Victims Ask Court To Prosecute the Vatican

By LAURIE GOODSTEIN, New York Times.
Published: September 13, 2011

Human rights lawyers and victims of clergy sexual abuse filed a complaint on Tuesday urging the International Criminal Court in The Hague to investigate and prosecute Pope Benedict XVI and three top Vatican officials for crimes against humanity for what they described as abetting and covering up the rape and sexual assault of children by priests.

Collateral damage

Mona — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 01:50:44 +0000

“Collateral damage is damage aside from that which was intended.”

There are many ways in which collateral damage has been and continues to be caused by the bishops of the Catholic Church as a secondary effect of its treatment of victims:

When the Church acts like a sexual offender, re-abusing innocent victims in its attempt to avoid more court cases and settlements
When bishops attempt to silence victims through lies (by applying the doctrine of “mental reservations”), intimidation, or threat of prosecution for court costs
When they protect, defend, and re-assign credibly accused and even admitted sexual offenders who cannot be prosecuted due to the statute of limitations
When they refuse to follow the guidelines they themselves have

… when they do any of these egregious things, they hurt not only the victims, but many, many others.

First of all there are the victims families, whose trust in the Church and in God is violently assaulted not so much by the original abusive behavior of one sick priest but by the ongoing systematic, cold-blooded, legalistic, un-Christian, sometimes illegal behavior of the organization which purports to be led by God’s representative and to be Christ’s presence in the world.

Then there are our friends, our co-workers and our clients, these people all become personally, if indirectly, exposed to the evil perpetrated by the Catholic bishops and the Vatican . They all become part of the collateral damage. If they remain faithful to the Church they will feel a conflict of loyalties, and may find it necessary to cut us out of their lives. If they are family this will cause a fracturing of the family unit. On the other hand if they are Catholics and remain faithful to us, they may find their support of and participation in the Church becomes untenable and their faith in God questionable. They may, like us, suffer spiritual trauma.

What happens when you rip the soul out of someone’s life? What happens when you destroy someone’s hope in a loving God? What happens when you tear someone from their support community, from their rituals of comfort and consolation, renewal and restoration? What happens when you emotionally or physically lock someone out of their spiritual refuge?

What happens is that people die — from the inside out.

Their soul shrivels, their hope disintegrates, their sense of belonging evaporates. It feels as if the hand of God that was holding them through life’s trials and losses is withdrawn, and they can fall into an abyss of depression, alcohol and drug abuse, relationship-destruction, self-destruction.

There have been many physical deaths among the community of victims and victims’ families, but there are many more spiritual deaths. One aspect of survivor support needs to be a spiritual outreach of some kind. We need to find ways to foster hope, dialogue about our understanding of God, share rituals of renewal and enrichment. We need to combat the spiritual death that is part of the collateral damage of the sexual abuse crisis.

From Hurt to Healing now available on Amazon ebooks

Mona — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 18:38:44 +0000

The second edition is the same except for a few additional paragraphs that include information I have gathered from family members since the initial publication of my book in 2004. These paragraphs are set apart as NOTES at the end of certain sections.

The second edition also contains a preview of my next book: From Faith, To Doubt, To … Hope? … Searching for Grace in the Brokenness. A story about the experience of Loss and the continued pursuit of Meaning and Hope.

Click HERE for more information about the ebook.

Nightmares that linger

Mona — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 21:58:36 +0000

What is it about nightmares that gives them so much power in the daytime? After all they’re not real, right? Right! And yet…

What seems to make my nightmares so powerful after I wake up is the fact that the feelings are very real. When I wake up I don’t leave the fear, panic, nausea, panic (yes I said panic twice — not sure how else to emphasize it) behind. It’s all still there. Even though the images are gone — as long as I can keep my eyes open and don’t slide off into the nightmare again — the feelings remain. And the feelings suck!

Last night, or to be precise 4.10am this morning, I woke up in the middle of a nightmare. I had been pursued by a rapist who morphed into a man in black (no surprises there) and I was somehow looking down on the top of his head trying to fly through a broken window to escape. Then he flew too, and all of a sudden the figure became quite demonic and exaggerated, evil personified if you like. The more religious might be inclined to say he became the devil, but to me “devil” is just a metaphor for evil. Either way you name it I was being pursued and trying to escape with my life. As is typical for me in such dreams, even when I try to interject the saving device of phoning for help, I can’t remember the phone number for my therapist or the police, and then the phone doesn’t work etc .etc. More panic.

This time I decided to jump into a body of water to escape … I think I was mixing religious mythology with the Wizard of Oz and hoping the devil would dissolve (melt). He did for a while and I sank into peacefulness. Quite happy to be succumbing to the watery depths. It was such a relief. The he loomed again in front of me in the water …. And I woke up. Panicked.

I paced the house for a while, trying not to wake my husband whose sleep patterns aren’t much better than my own, waiting for his alarm to sound so I could hang out for breakfast and experience some normalcy.

So, the dream was fiction but the feelings were real? Yes. And yet…

There it is, you see. Freud and Jung, psychologists and Jackson Square“mystics,” they all know there is more to reality than just our conscious, immediate awareness. However much we try to deny it, there is some “real” in our dreams. Connections to events, feelings, senses, movies and TV images, memories, thoughts, memories of thoughts, thoughts of memories…whatever. They can all play a part, as can our body chemistry. As a diabetic I know that I have cycles of blood levels during the night and that can affect the rest of my body I’m sure.

How we interpret dreams should I think be our own individual adventure. Look for repeated themes or obvious connections to the Law and Order episode you watched before bedtime. Consider what you ate or drank before bed and what your body might be trying to tell you. Don’t assume anything is a “revealed memory.” Just unwrap the feelings during the day, maybe journal, and then let them go and see what seems to want to stay around. Then … well then you have to ask the piece that won’t go away … What is it that I need to learn? But if you don’t get an answer, leave it be. If there is something for you to learn, it will come up again another time.