How do I process my grief?
Does suffering have any meaning?
Do we live in a random chaotic universe?
Is it time to re-evaluate my understanding of “God”?
This book is for anyone who has suffered a loss – of safety, of one’s home, of health, of a loved one or a relationship, or of one’s faith … and found themselves asking, “Why?” And then wondering, “Who am I asking?” and hoping they were not alone.
“Postman Pat, Postman Pat,
Postman Pat and his black and white cat,
Early in the morning,
Just as day is dawning,..”
The children’s tape player sang the words through its red and white face. Primary colors for a baby’s room. The tape was a distraction for me, and it covered my cries – but his hand usually sufficed.
People ask, How could a man, a priest? It’s popular to ask, now, those taboo questions. Safety in numbers for those who dare to criticize God’s men.
But that night, so many nights, no safety. No one questioning. Not even the mother. And the father? He was around.
My face hurts now, as I tell you this. Pain in my jaw like after a long session at the dentist. As if it had been stretched wide beyond its comfort. And my throat is tight, golf-ball sized anxiety, so I can’t catch my breath. Give me a minute, here!
…..
…..
It was always hard to breathe during story time.
And now the inevitable pain in my rectum. Even though I am telling you this over 50 years later, the pain memories are so near. They live in my muscles under my skin.
In prison there are similar pains for many of the inmates. But I am separate. Solitary. Suits me just fine! Dangerous, they say, to myself and others. A sociopath by nature, or a victim whose violation of his body caused an irreparable tear in his soul through which all feelings escaped. Which am I? Maybe you don’t believe in souls or God. That’s fine. I’m The Wrath of God … and no one wants to believe in me.
I sought out one of them, one of the owners of those bodies that stole my breath and my sanity. One of the Men in Black. I burned holes in his body where he had torn holes in mine. Pathology or justice? Am I a righteous man or a criminal? It’s up to you to decide, my twelve peers. But let me ask, first, that you take my place for just one night in that child’s bed, just one, and then you can judge me.
cold, cold, hard, damp tiles
bare feet
they didn’t care
with their thick shoes and heavy clothes
pale legs above bloodless toes
the cold hurts
before it numbs
but fear is hot
insides shaking
lips trembling
don’t cry, she warns
don’t whimper or weep
it will be worse for you
stand strong, little mona
stand and stare
see what they point to
see it and know
there is no safety
for little girls
who don’t do what they are told
tears fall silently
on downy cheeks
please don’t notice
i promise i’ll be good
i won’t make a sound
i’ll be daddy’s good girl
you’ll see
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.
Someone posted a letter on-line today with news of the death of a Benedictine monk – his abuser. The death may have brought “closure” for his abuser, he reflected, but not for him. Over the years he had planned then rejected both murder and suicide, but now he expressed sadness — for victims, but also for his abuser who, he realizes, must have been a troubled and twisted individual. The writer ended the letter with a blessing for his abuser! I was shocked. To have moved from considering murder, not so many years ago, to offering a blessing was incredible, I hesitate to use the word but — miraculous.
In his words:
“Today I visited Montserrat Abbey, the oldest Benedictine monastery in existence. I went into the Church. I don’t know God’s plan for me, I don’t know God’s plan for Fr. Roger, but in my own simple way, I said – And May God bless him.”
C Michael Coode (SNAP Tennessee)
Here was a victim who had retained his faith in God and was now dedicated to advocating for and supporting other victims through the National Survivor Advocates Coalition (NSAC) and through leadership in his local branch of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests and religious (SNAP). He had maintained his faith in God despite the overwhelming proof of negligence, deceit, and denial by the Catholic Bishops. He could still enter a monastery and not run out shaking and crying. He could still pray to a God he believes has a Plan.
I know one thing with absolute certainty: If there is a God and if there is a Plan it doesn’t involve abuse of children. What makes most sense to me is that God’s plan — call it “the best of all possible worlds” — is thwarted every time someone chooses to reject God in favor of doing evil. And so God has to adjust the plan. My heart tells me that in responding to evil with a blessing Michael has more than lived up to what God would hope for. There is NOTHING more powerful and more loving and healing in the world than responding to evil with goodness, offering a blessing instead of creating more suffering — by hurting oneself or others.
So, I responded to his post and offered Michael a blessing:
May you be blessed and comforted, may the light of Goodness shine upon you and bring you peace, and may you be filled with the healing power of Grace. You are my hero today.
To read the letter in its entirety you can go here:
http://nationalsurvivoradvocatescoalition.wordpress.com/___-8/
Statutes of limitations mean that most all the priests who have been identified as pedophiles cannot be prosecuted; so calls for civil and criminal prosecution are pointless. We need to change our laws to protect victims by making it possible to prosecute the offenders whenever the victims have the courage to come forward. My abusers are dead; that is the only reason others are safe from them. They both died as priests in good standing with the church even though complaints had been made.
I cried this morning because I miss my faith, I miss the comfort of it. I miss feeling safe in a church; I miss being able to pray. All I have right now is sadness, fear, nightmares and anger…so much anger.
There is no cure for pedophilia, just as there is no cure for alcoholism. Alcoholics in AA are given tools and support, not sent out to work in bars. It is expected that they will fail. But they can always come back and start over, because THEY ARE NOT CRIMINALS. But if they do break the law while drunk they are not given a FREE PASS from criminal prosecution.
Pedophile priests on the other hand were told there is a cure for their ”behavior,” that they can pray for healing and be absolved of their sins through reception of the Sacraments. And then they were sent out ”all fixed” to work with children in church schools, and take altar boys on trips.
When are we going to let go of the magical view of sacraments as a cure for psychological disorders. Sacramental healing is insufficient; pedophiles, given access to children will continue to offend, despite weekly absolution and daily Eucharist. It has been proven.
Prayer can be one tool but prayer alone is not enough. Pedophile priests have never been cured only moved around, and their perversions protected through systemic secrecy. They should have been required to attend pedophile support groups where the first thing they would do is introduce themselves and say, “I am a pedophile.” They should never be given work in parishes; they should have to identify themselves to the local law enforcement and communities as sex offenders. Of course that would require that they get prosecuted through the criminal courts first, and the financial and legal protection of the church and the complicity of civil authorities, along with the limitations of the statutes of limitations for child abuse cases, has made criminal prosecution virtually impossible. Pedophile priests should live under strict supervision like house arrest.
Finally, for those who say sexual abuse is a minor crime it doesn’t end lives, it most certainly does. SNAP has a data base of victims who have committed suicide, some after receiving a ”settlement.” The numbers continue to grow.
It is very, very hard to live through the horror of being a victim when day after day the papers reveal more evil in the Church’s systemic support for pedophiles and suppression of victims. And night after night we re-live the horrors of our own abuse in our nightmares. We, the victims, no longer have the support of our parishes or the sacraments to give us peace. Only the pedophile priests still have that. And they also get free counseling. For over a decade I have been attempting to get help with my ongoing mental health costs. The limited help I received was long ago exhausted and now other victims in my family are finally coming forward and are in need of help. We are just trying to survive.
My parents are in declining health and both in their 80’s, but they both recently recorded testimony about their abuse by two catholic priests. My dad gave his testimony in front of a diocesan representative. The same two priests who abused my parents (my dad from his teens into his thirties) went on to abuse me and two of my siblings. These priests are both dead, so why did my parents bother? Because my dad “wants to put it to rest” and my mother is still having nightmares and is hoping for some peace. I must admit that, while I hope they do get some relief, I really do, I am also filled with anger. My mother knowingly sent me on outings with the priest who had repeatedly assaulted and raped her. Maybe she did it to keep him away from her and thought I would be safe because I was a child and she knew from experience he liked adults. But parents are supposed to protect their children and keep them safe. He was a rapist. She sent me on outings with him and sent me over to his apartment to visit him. I can’t get my head around it. But still, she deserves some peace, now. I want him to stop visiting her in her nightmares; I want her to be able to retain the fact that he is long dead. From one conversation to the next, she asks again and again, “Is he dead? Oh, Thank God.” And a few minutes later, “I dreamt about him last night. Where is he now, is he dead, long dead? Oh, Thank God for that.”
And then I think, will I still be having nightmares in thirty years? Oh God, oh God, oh God.
On Yom Kippur Jews must first acknowledge their sins against others and make reparation for those sins, and then ask forgiveness directly from those they have hurt. Only then are they to turn to God and ask forgiveness for sins against God. As Catholics we are taught that sacramental absolution is sufficient for sins against others or against God – God will forgive us, the slate is wiped clean. We are not taught about the necessity of first going to those we have hurt and making reparation and asking forgiveness. It might be suggested as a good thing to do as part of our penance but it is not a pre-requisite for absolution. If sin and forgiveness were treated by Catholics the way Jews treat it then the two priests who abused my family might not have felt it sufficient to confess their sins to each other and offer and receive mutual sacramental absolution. Maybe, just maybe, they would have re-considered their crimes of rape and sodomy if they had believed they would not receive God’s forgiveness without first asking for ours.
Talking with Oprah
Have you ever asked yourself which TV show would be the best forum for your family story? Jerry Springer, CNN nightly news, Oprah?
You’re saying there were two priest abusers not one…and five victims in your family.
Yes, Jerry, that’s what I’m saying, on my mother’s grave.
Well, we have a surprise for you today…it seems your mother isn’t dead at all, and she’s flown in all the way from Knocklong…
Actually Jerry, when I said on my mother’s grave I wasn’t being literal, more ironic, if you like. She’s been dead to me for years.
Ah, but will you like what she has to tell you today. About how you abandoned her to a nursing home and are now trying to have your own father committed so you and your brothers can take all his money.
Boo… boo. (from the audience) That’s no way to treat your parents. They gave you everything.
Ah, yes, everything! The full Catholic catastrophe…a complete education in shame and guilt from the age of three, nurtured by the martyrdom of mothers and the folly of fathers. My Catholic Litany of the Saints included Saint Incestua and Saint Sodomatus. The Irish boys and men in my family have made many novenas on their knees to these saints, but you won’t find them in any official prayers. What you do find, though, are the role models young Catholics are meant to emulate: a virgin mother doting on her only son– a god in her eyes– and an apparently cuckolded father who is good with his hands but a complete failure when it comes to planning a vacation, doesn’t think to book ahead, just expects there to be a room when he needs it. So for the rest of his life he has had to hear:
A barn! You expected me to give birth in a barn? Did you even notice the odor. You didn’t of course.
No…But?…
“Let me tell the story, Joseph, and don’t interrupt.”
Yes dear.
He stayed outside around the camp fire with all the other men, drinking and telling stories, praying for a son not a daughter, and there I was biting down on a rag for the pain, wanting it out of me, and trying not to retch from the smell of animal excrement all around. And then they put my newborn baby in a feed trough. For the love of God, what were you thinking you eejit. (That’s Irish for idiot).
And then there’s the son. He lives at home until he’s 30. No woman can match his mother. He looks down on the profession his step-dad has chosen for him, preferring to study scripture. And he hangs out with a bunch of friends who end up leaving their wives and kids at home to go on a road trip with him to the big city, where he gets himself arrested for disturbing the peace. Then things get really messed up. He can’t afford a lawyer, there is perjured testimony, and he ends up being executed. His mother blames it on his friends, of course.
“If you hadn’t broken the law he wouldn’t have been arrested. It’s all because of you. Lord love us and save us!”
Eventually all of Christianity assumes that burden of wrong, and all our sins become part of the cause of this son’s death. The Train to Guiltville has taken off. With stops on the way at penance, flagellation, starvation, mortification and a Grotto to all mothers. In the dining car, shame pudding will be served topped with a glaze of self-hatred.
So, in Catholicism these are the role models we have to offer our Catholic children: a virgin mother, a cuckolded father, a perfect son, self-abusing saints. And people wonder why we are so screwed up.
OK, so maybe the characters in your internal dialogue don’t have their own sensationalist talk show, or speak with Irish accents. But I grew up with watching Sean Connery play a Russian naval officer and a British spy — both with a Scottish accent. I’m sure he’d play Jesus himself with a brogue.
On CNN— late-breaking news of a Catholic family that was more like a Catholic cult. The ATF have uncovered a garage filled with antique cars and gallon bottles of illegal white lightning that the locals call potheen (pronounced putcheen), apparently brewed by a family member, a retired police officer. The investigation is ongoing but it appears the Patriarch of the clan has a getaway planned to a private golf resort in Spain, where he recently acquired a brand new apartment. The source of the funds for this venture remain a mystery to family and friends alike. A local citizen who spoke under guarantee of anonymity revealed that the head of this family was under investigation by the IRS for falsely reporting income and property. More later–when we interview a 27-year-old woman who claims to have borne the 82-year-old man’s love child just last year.
Much of this is actually true ( not the love child bit though) as are some of the details in the Springer conversation. So you can see how some of my family story could easily belong on the evening news. But a reporter would just take one piece and spin a three-minute segment and that would be that. Unless someone in my family pulls a gun and gets chased through the streets of Knocklong in a white van. But even then the locals would only manage updates from some nitwit up a tree with an instamatic trying to follow the chase, shouting down what he sees. There are no police helicopters in Knocklong village. Three bars, two churches, a grocery store, a beauty parlor and a car rental. But no police cars, let alone helicopters.
We all have dialogues going on inside our heads, (in Scottish accents or not) and I happen to imagine famous people in the dialogue. I especially like talking to Oprah. Oprah is my internal guru. I talk to her regularly, in the shower or blow-drying my hair, or driving. And I imagine her responses. They are always thoughtful and meaningful, not shallow and contrived, or manipulative -in order to elicit the greatest emotional reaction. Oprah seems to want the truth told. I’ve watched her. She expects sincerity and does not brook duplicity. In our talks she usually just asks me leading questions and I find myself thinking more clearly as I formulate an answer. I learn to be succinct; I become more coherent; my comments become eloquent. I know that if Oprah believes me (even my imaginary companion Oprah) I am believable.
Our guest today has had a tragic life. You probably will have trouble believing her, I did at first. But our initial disbelief didn’t upset or surprise her. You see, Mona didn’t believe her own life story until all the pieces began to fall into place. Over the past two years, members of her family have reached out to break their silence and own their part in this complex and twisted tale of moral bankruptcy, collusion, rape, abuse and deception. The story she tells will shock you, disturb you, perhaps even shake your faith in the Catholic Church, but Mona is adamant that she does not want to hurt people’s faith in God. Indeed Mona claims that if it weren’t for an ongoing sense of God’s presence in her life she might have given up on herself long ago. So please give a warm Oprah welcome to…
Ah, Oprah! Maybe one day we will actually meet. But if not, thanks for listening and helping me work through stuff. Thanks for being my internal guru, my imaginary friend.
From Hurt to Healing 