The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2015 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 32,000 times in 2015. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 12 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
It has been quite along time since I have posted on the blog. I suppose like a lot of us I view the blog most weeks and read recent posts and comments with interest, always promising myself that “next week” I will post or comment myself.
Next week turns into next month …….
A fire needs feeding or the embers will turn to cold ash. Most of the traffic on the blog these days concerns the abuse that occurred at Mirfield all those years ago. It is a good vehicle for this purpose, but it is still a good way to reminisce and renew old friendships and create new ones.
I have heard a few comments that people need to get “over it, put it behind them and get on with their lives”. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Comments from whatever quarter are welcome,they are the catalyst for debate. To this end I will post a bit more regularly.
Some months ago a family member approached me with the revelation that the daughter of a cousin on my wife’s side of the family was struggling alone to come to terms with abuse she suffered at school.
She has set up her own blog as an aid to closure. I had promised to post her details on the blog to gain some support for her so here, “better late than never”
Dave, they are http:/hummingbird02.wordpress.com/author/blueswift82/
Thanks for looking ,comments appreciated.
All the best Degs
Ps thanks for all, too many to mention , who contributed to my ,”This is your life book “for my 60’th birthday (thought I had managed to slip that one under the radar!!!!
If you are interested in this blog you may be interested in seeing the film Spotlight.
Spotlight tells the true story of a Boston Globe investigation that would rock the city and cause a crisis in one of the world’s oldest and most trusted institutions. When the newspaper’s tenacious “Spotlight” team of reporters delve into allegations of abuse in the Catholic Church, their year-long investigation uncovers a decades-long cover-up at the highest levels of Boston’s religious, legal, and government establishment, touching off a wave of revelations around the world.
The film is released in the UK on 29 January.
How to Settle 575 Cases of Clerical Sexual Abuse and
Remain Financially Unscathed in Milwaukee.
(Adapted and abridged by Brian Hennessy from a report in the Catholic National Reporter).
In less than two hours a US federal judge approved a plan that allowed the Milwaukee Archdiocese to emerge from bankruptcy after nearly five years of legal battles. Archbishop Jerome Listecki spoke briefly on 9th November 2015 in a courtroom packed with sexual abuse survivors and more than 20 lawyers. Listecki praised the abuse victims for coming forward, saying they had raised the consciousness of the archdiocese and elsewhere. He said, “There is no resolution that will bring back what they have lost,” and he added that he hoped the confirmation of the plan will turn the corner for the archdiocese, allowing it to focus on charitable, educational and spiritual work. “When we have a strong church, we have a strong community”, he said. What he did not say was that the diocese, in filing for bankruptcy, had got off almost scot-free!
Yet, of the 575 abuse survivors, about 120 received only $2,000 each; 336 shared what remained and the remaining 119 got nothing. The archdiocese had reviewed the claims themselves and had assigned the claimants to the various categories. It was a process criticized in court by survivor Steven Schmidt. The survivors were then required to vote on the plan. Some 93 percent of those in the group who were to receive the larger settlements voted to approve the plan – but only 61 percent of the group due to receive the smaller amount approved it. One survivor was placed initially in the category of those who would receive nothing because he could not identify his abuser by name. After he filed a formal objection with the court, the archdiocese identified his abuser. He then questioned how thoroughly the archdiocese had looked for unnamed offenders, thus denying some victims payment. “They knew who these offenders were and covered up their crimes,” he told the National Catholic Reporter. “If you cover up the crime, you shouldn’t be allowed to investigate it.” A dozen other survivors gathered on the steps of the courthouse and vowed to continue their fight for justice. Peter Isely, the Midwest director of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) and one of the first Milwaukee victims to come forward more than 25 years ago, charged that about 100 priests named in the claims filed by victims remain unnamed by the archdiocese.
Peter Isely also called for an investigation into financial fraud, particularly pertaining to the transfer of some $57 million into a trust fund for the perpetual care of the archdiocese’s cemeteries. As for the allegations, the archdiocese filed for bankruptcy protection in January 2011, but Archbishop Timothy Dolan, who was named head of the New York archdiocese in 2009 and a cardinal in 2012, had been talking about the possibility of filing for bankruptcy as early as 2004. However, in 2007, before filing for bankruptcy Archbishop Dolan removed $57 million from the diocesan general fund into a Catholic Cemetary trust fund shortly after the Wisconsin Supreme Court opened the door to lawsuits. At the time, Archbishop Dolan’s letter to the Vatican and the latter’s rapid approval of the plan for the Cemetary trust fund made international headlines. In an editorial, The New York Times called the revelations “shocking.” Peter Isely asserted that the trust fund was created by the Archbishop, in part, to prevent courts from compensating victims of clergy sex abuse and that there seemed to be sufficient evidence and justification, to warrant an investigation.
A lawyer, David Asbach, confirmed that he met with Isely and others from the group but said he could not comment on the case or on whether he made a referral to the U.S. Attorneys Office for prosecution. Jack Ruhl, a professor of accountancy at Western Michigan University who has extensively studied Catholic diocesan finances said that the transfer of the money was unusual. He told the National Catholic Reporter that he had never seen a “reclassification” of funds like this one, albeit one California bishop had been scolded by a bankruptcy judge for not being forthcoming with financial data, and the Minneapolis-St. Paul archdiocese had renamed a fund, making it the property of parishes, before filing for bankruptcy. “It probably has been done in the past in other dioceses, but it’s hard to detect,” Ruhl said. “They don’t have to release any financial data and what is released is not useful.” Ruhl also said the lack of information on how the Milwaukee archdiocese arrived at the amount of money needed for the perpetual care of the cemeteries was not transparent. “I found no explanation in the court documents for how they arrived at that number,” he said.
The losers in the bankruptcy case were not only the Victims who each received meagre payouts – or nothing at all because the diocese would not or could not identify the abusers, but also the State court lawyers who worked for years without pay and will receive up to 40 percent of each of their clients’ settlement. While those lawyers will receive something, they have battled in state courts for 20 years without compensation. The Messmer High School, an independent Catholic school that serves Milwaukee’s African-American community, lost $3.4 million in support that the archdiocese had pledged when the school took over two feeder schools from the archdiocese in 2007. “We Energies”, the provider of electrical power, lost revenue of $129,437 – a sum to be picked up by the other ratepayers in the area. The Milwaukee Water Works lost revenue of $25,589, a sum that will be paid by other users. The Green Bay diocese’s tribunal lost $15,000. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops lost $9,621. A number of contractors, office suppliers and other vendors lost between $773 and $9,888. In fact, all creditors were to be paid up to $5,000 of their bills, but lost the rest.
The winners of the legal settlement are, as always, the bankruptcy lawyers representing both the archdiocese and the creditors – who will receive about $20 million. Another $4.5 million will go to the lawyers involved in the cemetery trust litigation that the archdiocese says should not be included in the cost of the bankruptcy. Each of the parishes contributed $2,000 to a therapy fund for abuse victims and, as a consequence, those parishes bought immunity from future lawsuits. The Milwaukee archdiocese gained a fresh start without debt; it sold no property to reach the settlement. It emerged from the bankruptcy settlement largely intact. The diocesan cemetary fund is $57 million better off!
Leading pianist backs new bid to encourage victims of paedophiles to break their silence.
“Being heard, being met with belief, understanding and compassion, feeling safe from judgment, criticism and blame – these things are the keys to rebuilding trust and starting the healing process,” he writes.
… an article in today’s Sunday Observer — well worth reading.
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/dec/13/abused-pianist-says-threats-keep-victims-silent
Today for the first time in many years l have seen the name of Domenico Vallmagia who abused me when he was in charge of the infirmary. My reaction to this was to beg my parents not to make me return after the summer holidays. My father was adamant that I return. I couldn’t tell him my reason for not going back. I was duly bundled off to the station and sent back. I’m not really clear as to how things happened thereafter. I know that I started wetting the bed, a very humiliating occurrence in a shared dormitory. I was a very confident boy, this did not help. I think a small cohort of us got a bit rebellious. I might have got a little aggressive with one or two who thought of themselves as the chosen ones. I don’t remember the date but I was ignominiously booted out ( I can verify the date ). ” Sent home in DISGRACE!” My father picked me up at the station and didn’t speak to me for ten years! My home life from there on was a misery. This lead from me being a promising student to pretty much failing a every level. This has greatly affected my life choices. It was not until my mid forties that I established any sort of relationship with my father. It was not until his death that this all came flooding back. Although I still never broached the subject with him.
The Cost to the Catholic Church of Clerical Sexual Abuse
A recently published academic paper, “Losing my Religion: The Effects of Religious Scandals on Religious Participation and Charitable Giving”, was published in the September issue of the United States “Journal of Public Economics” by the authors, Nicholas Bottan and Ricardo Perez-Truglia. The latter, previously an economist working with Microsoft, was recently interviewed by the “Catholic Reporter”.
On the face of it, this paper by two Chilean economists on the economic effects of Catholic Church scandals in the United States is a bit “heavy” for the average “O” level mathematician! However, the conclusions of the research into 3,000 sexual abuse scandals in US Catholic Church parishes is nothing less than staggering. This is not on account of the costs of the legal fees and settlements alone – which in the last four decades has totalled approximately US$ 3 billion – but the surprise revelation of the report is the ongoing annual decline in charitable donations to Church parishes and Church activities that were directly affected by the abuse.
The analysis revealed that incidents of clerical sexual abuse have had a direct and “permanent” impact on not only charitable giving, but also on “religious affiliation” in those parishes where clerical sexual abuse had been revealed. During the 40 years studied the average “annual” decline (year on year) in charitable giving has been calculated to have been US$ 2.36 billion. That is a total of US$ 94.4 billion! Many Catholics (10%}abandoned the Catholic Church altogether and children were withdrawn from Catholic schools. As a result of the latter, it is estimated that in the period 2002-2010, 23% of the 1,130 Catholic school closures in the United States were directly attributable to abuse scandals.
A re-examination of Catholic affilition in parishes affected by abuse scandals after a 10 year period has revealed that there has been no recovery of the losses in affiliation subsequent to the decline. Furthermore, the research found that those that had abandoned the Catholic Church had not lost their “faith”, but they had simply abandoned the Catholic Church as an “institution”. Many were found by the researchers to be attending services at churches of other denominations.
The abandonment of the Catholic Church as an institution, I deduce, must be attributable to the manner in which abuses cases were handled by the Bishops and Religious Leaders as much as to the incidents of clerical abuse itself. The scenario is now well known: failure to investigate, oaths of secrecy, denial, obfuscation, destruction of documents, failure to report to civil authorities, and the shunting around of paedophile clerics to new parishes where they remained unmonitored and re-offended. The list goes on.
I suggest that the United States experience is not an isolated one. Indeed the United Kingdom group of abused seminarians, known as the “Mirfield 12”, are fully aware that the London Province of the Comboni Missionary Order is suffering. In 2014 I looked at their accounts lodged with the Charities Commission. I was able to deduce that the average income from donations in the period 2008 to 2012 had been in the region of Pounds Sterling1,250,000. In 2013, when the abuses at Mirfield started to break in public awareness, the donations had slumped to Pounds Sterling 877,740. In 2014, the period of maximum public exposure of the sexual abuse that had been perpetrated at the seminary, there was a further decline in donations to Pounds Sterling 624,507. If the United States findings are mirrored in the United Kingdom, the Comboni Missionary Order can expect a further – and even a continual – decline in the level of donations. Ongoing legal actions and the possibility of futher legal cases will maintain the Order in continually hightened Catholic visibility. Given the Order’s high administrative costs and additional “extraordinary expenditure”, this may give rise to the future scenario that the Order’s continued presence within the British Isles is financially no longer viable.
It is interesting to note, as in the case of the United States experience, that a loss of religious affiliation goes hand in hand with a decline in charitable giving. This is clearly not attributable only to the original sexual abuse itself, but also to the manner in which the appropriate authorities have dealt with it. Of course, apart from Battersea and Sunningdale, the Comboni Missionary Order does not operate in specific parishes. Nevertheles, the Catholic public throughout the United Kingdom will already be well aware from press revelations (and no less from this website) that the Comboni Missionary Order, contrary to statements made by Pope Francis and the policies of the British Catholic Hierarchy, have not managed the allegations of abuse well. Indeed, they have flouted Canon Laws, Civil laws, Safeguarding Policies and their own Code of Conduct – in addition to maintaining the public stance that the Victims are “money-grabbing liars”. Things could have been different. The Victims wanted understanding, a hearing and an apology. They got silence – broken only by denials and malignant jibes. The Comboni Missionary Order will reap what they have sewn – and it is already clear that their crop is lessening year by year.
Hi. I read your concerns with great interest as your story mirrors that of so many of us – and your reflections on the hold of religion on innocents from birth through to the grave is universal. I also noted your hesitation. You know what you should do, but you refrain from doing it -because the power exerted by religion -every religion – is both colossal and insidiously polluting to the innocent mind. Priests were all god-like. They could do no wrong… and even when they have committed heinous crimes against you – you remain ambivalent about the logical solution. I was the same as you. If it had been left to me – I would have continued to suffer in my mental turmoil – find excuses for the priest who made me captive and abused me at will – and juggled, forgetting absurdly that I was child at the time, with guilt as to whether I was complicit, or enjoyed the abuse or egged him on. The fact is that I was so bloody naive and trusted my abuser so implicitly that I would not have noticed if I had journeyed to Hell and back during his self-gratifying and sordid abuse. He was a priest. He was God’s right hand man on this earth – and I wanted to be like him. So what turned me into a Victim with a cause? Just one thing. It was not what “he” did to me so much as what the Comboni Missionary Order did to him. Nothing! That is: nothing negative! The continual abuse of minors by this priest was not the subject of any inquiry. He was not reported to the Constabulary for a crime in accordance with UK law. He thus was never charged in a criminal court for his crimes. He was not reported to the Vatican. He was thus not defrocked. He was temporarily considered for a mission appointment where he could continue to abuse children at will- but ill-health prevented that. Eventually he was “incardinated” to a parish in his home province of Como so that he could be near his family -and he was given a nice pension to enjoy his semi-retirement for the rest of his days. When I tried to make contact with him through the Order in later life, they told me, in effect, that he was dead – but he was not dead and the Order knew that very well. Of all these failures of the Comboni Missionary Order that prompted me into action -was the fact that the Order habitually disposed of criminal child abusers to the missions -or in the case of the priest who abused me -to a parish -where there was the opportunity for a criminal paedophile cleric to continue his self-gratifying debauchery. That is not God’s work. It is the work of all-powerful, perfidious, pernicious, unaccountable religion. They were more concerned with their own image than the crimes committed against children. Put differently – being a money-making enterprise -they were concerned with a reduction to the flow of donations. In a strange twist of logic, they refer to Victims as “money-grabbing liars” – apparently absurdly oblivious to the fact that they are precisely that. I think your only realistic option in conscience – would be to show them your Ace cards – and call their bluff. Its time for action my dear friend Boy X -whose true name I know not -but whose suffering I have felt for so long. It will help you to stand proud again – to be unashamed – to be whole and to be purged of the stink of the defilement of your innocence – as opposed to your inaction -which helps them.
By Brian Mark Hennessey
The Indian Cardinal Oswald Gracias, who is assisting in drafting the final document of the ongoing Synod of Bishops, says that he believes that the Pope is inclined to entrust more authority to the regional Conferences of Bishops. He gave three examples of matters that could be outsourced from the Vatican – and one of those was clerical sexual abuse – currently dealt with in house by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith!
It is reported in the National Catholic Reporter of 23rd October that Cardinal Gracias said in a press statement that it was “practically and logistically impossible to have one office in the Vatican in Rome dealing with all the cases of clerical sexual abuse in the world”. So – it seems, the administration of crimes of clerical sexual abuse may well be shunted back to the Bishops and Religious Superiors.
It was Pope John Paul II who originally, in modern times, determined in 2001 in his Motu Propio, “Sacramentorum Sanctiatus Tutela”, that, apart from sexual solicitations in the confessional, all allegations of sexual abuse by clerics should be dealt with by the local Bishops and Religious Superiors.
What a calamity that proved to be! The Bishops and Religious Superiors failed consistently and manifestly to take any action at all. The majority of allegations were ignored. Clerics committing sexual abuse were simply moved on to where they could abuse again and where often they could not be discovered by the very Victims whom they had abused. Contrary to Canon Law, the civil law enforcement and welfare agencies were not informed of allegations. No monitoring of the abusers was implemented. Inconsistency and denial reined.
It took decades of the clamour from the voices of Victims of clerical sexual abuse to get a response from the Catholic Church. That response was to ensure that Victims were heard (at least in theory – even if not in practice) – and eventually Victims were led to believe that this Pope cared – and he would lead the charge in Rome to rid the Church of this pestilence. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, formerly known more notoriously as the Papal States Inquisition, was to be the instrument of this root and branch revival.
Yet, it appears, there remains a vast difference between what Vatican says and Vatican does. Recent history relates that neither Bishops nor Religious Superiors gave in the past, nor give in the present, any heed whatsoever to Canon Law, nor Cardinal, nor Pope.
The Mirfield 12 group of sexually abused boy seminarians know very well that nothing has factually changed despite all the virtuous statements. Their only experience has been one of empty promises, silence, ignorance and false accusations of being money-grabbing liars.
So the Vatican experiment in dealing with all the world’s cases of sexual abuse with care, compassion, consistency and rigour may well be over. They have been defeated, it seems, by the huge scale of this criminal activity within church and cloister. What an unintended admission of Cardinal Gracias!
So what now? It seems that the Vatican may well take the opportunity of deflecting criticism of their failed management of clerical sexual abuse by shunting it back to the hoards of corrupt bishops who failed to manage the problem before.
Their is a better solution! Whilst clerical sexual abuse, particularly of minors, may be a “sin” – it is a breach of trust at the highest end of the scale. It is also one of the cruellest, most callous, heinous and abhorrent civil criminal offences known to mankind. Let the Catholic Church do what any other world organisation would do. Let them:
1. Inform the Civil Law authority of the allegation immediately it is received.
2. Suspend the alleged cleric from all duties immediately.
3. Insist that all investigation is undertaken by the Civil authority and make the cleric available promptly.
4. Provide to the Civil authority all pertinent documentation in their possession without delay or obfuscation.
5. Immediately respond to the results of any Court verdict of guilty by instant dismissal of the cleric from the clerical state.
No ifs. No buts! No dilly dallying. No compensation, nor farewell payments, nor pensions. The Catholic Church must meet out to convicted criminal clerics the same standard of punitive terminal measures and treatment that any convicted criminal civilian in the world could expect to receive from any organisation to which that convicted criminal formerly belonged. It really is that simple! Clerics who commit crimes of sexual abuse are criminals – not special cases. The Catholic Church must get real!
Firstly, I would like to thank Gerry and Tony for their supportive comments,advice and wishes, posted on the blog on the 18th and 19th September. I would also like to thank the others who have, in the past, acknowledged me on the blog.
I have spent some time now pondering over Gerry’s advice. I suppose I have missed out so far from the advantages that being connected with the group would possibly bring. I do give the matter a lot of thought but sometimes I wonder if thinking too much just always leads to the reinforcement of the things that invariably lead to inaction. It seems to be a never ending battle between, on the one hand, being a captive to that control through belief in a religion, regardless of how irrational that belief , and reason i.e. rational thought, on the other hand . The battle within myself between belief through indoctrination and reason, has only ever resulted in one outcome. With me, reason has always lost out which only goes to show the power that indoctrination has had over me. Essentially it’s a battle between thoughts that result in negative emotions and thoughts based on good reasoning.
I do admit that my thinking and resulting feelings have been all over the place but I have come to one conclusion It’s something I have known for a long time but have been reluctant to acknowledge or accept it. Organised religion is all about power and control. But knowing and recognising that,doesn’t free me from remaining a captive of that control. Of course, that indoctrination began at the moment of birth. I know that some of the others who were abused have been able to cast off that control,to some extent anyway. But we are all individuals and all victims of our own particular circumstances. I can only speak for myself in this.
I was born on the west coast of Ireland and baptised the day after I was born. That was the beggining of my captivity. The church was the master of all it surveyed. It controlled everything and controlled your very thoughts. You could be sent to hell for thought crime and anything done that displeased the church would lead to being ostracised by the community you lived in. Abused women were tied for ever to their abusive husband, and visa vera. Children born outside of marriage became the ‘disappeared’. They would be ghosted away to Scotland or England, or end up unwanted and in an orphanage where they they were abused,anywhere where the ‘shame’ and the ‘sin’ could not be seen. The church permiated every part of society and every part of your being. Of course the church had and has to keep the ‘flock’ on board regardless of what ‘sin’ they {the flock} commit. The church with their preachments sends you to hell one minute but then offers you the get out, salvation, through confession. When it comes to themselves, why bother the secular courts and judges with matters that can be dealt with by the greatest judge of all, ‘God’. All they have to do is pop into a box,say they’re sorry, and all is forgiven. Contrition of course is important. Being contrite is essential for forgivness and then when it all happens again,which it does, it ‘s easy, just repeat the process. Just repent and be contrite again and again and again. They are ‘saved’ regardless of any evil they do.
There’s another matter that bothers me a lot. It’s a moral question. Inaction shouldn’t be an option. Inaction is immoral in that it allows the evil to continue without a challenge. To turn inaction into action, I need to overcome the hurdle constructed not only by being sexually and emotionally abused, but also by a religion which enslaves the mind to the extent that even when the doors to the prison of the mind are thrown open through reason, it still seems nearly imposible, for me anyway, to walk through those open doors. Until I can free myself of that, unless I can find a way of casting off that indoctrination I will remain in that limbo, a nowhere land where rational thought seems powerless in the face of a lifetime of indoctrination. I don’t want to remain in that place where I am tied by the past and unable, because of that, to do anything. How do I unravel myself from that guilt and shame and fear that I described in an earlier post to the blog as being woven into me and became part of the fabric of who I am. I know I will never be able to free myself totally from the effects of those different forms of abuse, indoctrination into theism and sexual and emotonal abuse. That would be hoping for the impossible. But for me personally, the hope I now have is in being able,even though slowly, to distance myself more and more from theistic belief, which, I hope, would have an impact on the guilt and shame which are the creation of that theistic belief. I suppose I could summarise the whole damb thing by saying the church destroyed my life, as it has countless others, but I suppose I should count myself lucky that I can say that these days without running the risk of being tortured on the rack as a heretic. I suppose we all have, to a great extent, to find our own way through the hell that was forced on us by being abused and by being the captives of a system, a religion, that has always been about control. control of the mind by means of instilling fear, shame and guilt.
When it comes to Mirfield, I must admit that my thoughts and feelings are full of confusion and contradictions. There are things I hate about Mirfield and there are things I love. I can understand why others who were fortunate enough to not be victims of the abuse, have fond memories of Roe Head. The more I remember my early days there, before the abuse started, which ruined my life, the more I know I was once in a place where I was happy. I certainly was not aware of any of the points I made earlier about theism and organised religion, so that didn’t bother me. I suppose that was a case of ‘ignorance is bliss’. I can see the possible benefits that revisiting Mirfield might bring, perhaps the possibility of exorcising some demons. I suppose it would all depend on the intent of the visit. But there is another side to it,something that frightens me even more. I feel that if there is any place in this world that might throw me into still further confusion it would be Mirfield. I ask myself if I really want to revisit a place and time where a big part of me still is. I know this may sound rather off the wall, but I am still drawn to the good things, the good memories. I know that this is a case of emotion defeating reason but perhaps it might have something to do with my memories of the good things being so much in contrast with the bad things, the good things representing the former me,the person I was, the person they killed. That person I was, would have grown into a better person with a different life than the disaster that my life became.
The more I remember my former self the more I long to return to 1963 when I first set foot in Roe Head. It was a wonderful time of my life and I miss it so much. Something I have said before, something that still remains with me, it’s strange how long suppressed memories from over half a century ago escape when allowed to and become just as vivid as things right now . Perhaps it’s better to try and keep them securely locked away even though that doesn’t really help deal with the problem. The faces of friends are as clear as they were then and with that comes that realisation it’s where I have have been all along. I do understand the problem. It’s like never growing up ,never growing old, never moving on, never maturing, just transforming into the unacceptable.It’s being back in a world never really left. It has always linguered there somewhere in my mind but now can become as real as today’s reality. It all comes to life . Forever looking for something lost, something stolen,something precious and irreplaceable.
I did go through a phase just recently when I welcomed remembering more of the good things because it did seem to bring some comfort, But now, it only brings feelings of despair. Despair in knowing that it’s all gone. I don’t know what else to say. Perhaps I’m mourning my dead self, as someone suggested. So that is my dilema. I’m not sure I could face going to Roe Head only to find an empty, bare landscape. It’s the same with reunions. I don’t know that I could face meeting again those I remember from Mirfield and by doing so have to then face the stark reality that Roe Head and my friends are gone forever. It’s just all confusion but I suppose I should be thankful that I am aware of the problem regardless of how painful that is.
But I must move forward. I have to start doing and not just remain in a world of thoughts and emotions. Perhaps the first thing I should do, regardless of the difficulties, is just turn up to the next reunion and see where that takes me.
Besides the prospect of that helping me, I feel I could and would contribute to the fight against that organisation, the church, which has destroyed our lives. It isn’t just about individuals doing evil things, it’s about fighting a system that is evil by it’s very nature.
Boy X
Comboni Missionaries 