Sexual Abuse by My Parish Priest: How the Trauma Robbed Me of My Childhood and Almost Left Me without God
By Terry Reis Kennedy
Yes! Here I am—another survivor of a sick priest’s obsession with sexually abusing children.
I was nine-years old when the curate of our small-town church in Vermont lured me into his life. It started with rides to the local swimming areas, always with a group of other girls. Then there were rides to see Catholic shrines at further distances. My hard-working blue-collar parents and my immigrant grandmother were thrilled that I was in the company of one of God’s own. I was pretty happy too. It was fun to go to the lakes, have cookouts, and sing with my friends in the car on the way home—until the priest started having sex with me.
I had always loved God from the first minute my grandmother told me about Him. She pointed out the Divinity in each and every plant in her garden. God was in the pink peonies; He was what made the blue delphiniums so mysteriously brilliant. God sent the rain to grow the potatoes and the red-current bushes. God sent the sun to shine on the tiny nests of birds. God was anywhere I looked, my old grandmother taught me. If God was everywhere, as she said, then why did she warn me to stay away from strangers? I didn’t question her; I just did what I was told. I loved my grandmother as much as I loved God.
By the time winter came, my world had turned to Hell. It was far worse than the Hell that Grammy said awaited sinners and those who did not believe in God. It was the Hell that only a sexually traumatized child can know, a Hell that few are able to articulate. But I am no longer silent. My gag has been removed. And my mask is gone. I am able to speak openly about this Hell. And I will keep on doing so until my very last breath. The sins of the reverend fathers are not the sins of the children!
The abuse of my body and my mind was not as painful as the amputation of my heart. Left with only a stump, I could no longer love. I could go through the motions of love, yes. But like the blind who have to learn how to “see” in a different way, that is what a sexually traumatized child must learn to do, “feel” without feeling. Until one day a miracle might happen, as it did for me. It took many years and extensive therapy, and, of course, the Grace of God, before I could function normally again.
When I was nine, I weighed about 25 pounds, if that... The priest was about 6 feet tall and weighed close to 200 pounds. He was in his 20s. First there was kissing and then fondling and before long, full-blown rape. In the beginning, this happened on a daily basis. The rapes were anal, most of the time, especially after I started to menstruate. It sounds unbelievable to most who hear the stories of children like me, but we keep quiet out of fear.
I was terrified to tell the nuns at my Catholic school or my parents because the priest told me that he was God. I believed him. He said that when he put on his stole, a supposedly holy vestment that looks like a starched white scarf, he became God on earth. He wore this scarf when he heard my confession, which was right after he used my body to satisfy himself. He told me that I was a very bad sinner and that I was the one who made him do the things he did to me. At the time I did not know he was doing it to dozens of other girls as well. I thought I was the only one.
He said that God would destroy me and my family if I told anyone. In the 1950s, I think even grown-ups believed priests. I was unable to extricate myself from this priest until I was 19 years old. The priest continued to pursue me even when I was getting my undergraduate degree at college. I went to several other priests seeking solutions to the problem. All they ever did was hear my confession and grant me absolution. I grew more and more depressed.
Finally, after graduation, I got married to get away from the priest. Right away, I had three children and left the Church. I rationalized it was too difficult to go to Mass and take care of my children that were very close in age. Motherhood saved me from remembering. I was so busy there was no time to look back over my shoulder. I had to have a hysterectomy for cancer when I was 26, which I believe was caused by the childhood sex with a fully developed man. My depression worsened. I began therapy at that time. By now, I was really angry with God. I chose to stop praying. Eventually, I went to graduate school believing that with a career, I would no longer be depressed. And it worked. I totally blocked out everything that had happened to me. Or, so I thought.
When I entered my late 40s, memories of my childhood sexual trauma erupted like a volcano from my subconscious and poured into my conscious mind. By then I had lived a life of ruined relationships, failed marriages, and my family, except for my youngest brother, disowned me. My father was dead. My mother speculated that I was making the whole story up when I confronted her. When she threw me out of her house and her life, I died again.
Meantime, I had shifted from one job to the next. The better the job, the faster I fled. I ran and ran and ran, but I got nowhere. In 46 years I had moved 39 times. After my first divorce, I even moved away from my teenage sons and a daughter when I fled New England for California. I was not in an asylum, but my mind was not working. I made sure that I stayed broke and on the run. My kids, as they grew older, resented me more. They did not understand what was wrong with me.
All the while, something was pursuing me. I did not know it was my own Child Self trying to catch up to me, trying to get me to save her. Each day when I woke up I did not know what would happen to me. I was plagued with agoraphobia and panic attacks, but I carried on as best I could. I took up excessive drinking which led to drunk-driving citations which put me behind bars. After bouts of remorse and long periods of absolutely no drinking, I’d be off and running again. I kept hooking up with abusive men wondering why the world was so cruel. I sought all sorts of therapy and I got all sorts of help. But until my deep, dark secret exploded, I had no idea what was really wrong with me.
In my search for answers to what possessed me to act crazy, I ended up in an ashram in India. It was there, while sitting quietly in the early afternoon sunshine, that the dark sepia images of what the priest had done to me began to surface. They came across my vision like a slide show. Sometimes they were flashbacks that rolled on like a movie. But nothing was ever in color, not even the scenes full of blood. I was shivering as if it was a freezing cold day and I was stark naked. What the heck was going on? What were these pictures?
I rushed to a therapist who was visiting the ashram from California. I explained the scenes I was beholding. She calmed me down somewhat and after working with her in the US for nearly two years, I got the courage to confront my perpetrator, who was in his 70s then. I made my peace with God and understood that all through my travails He had been right there beside me. When I had driven more than 75 miles in a complete blackout and woke up with the headlights of an 18-wheeler shining in my eyes. The California Highway Patrol officers beating on the hood of my sports car, I knew that God had saved me for something! And today, I believe that it was God who gave me the tremendous courage it took for me to sue the Church.
The priest, who had been living with a 16-year old girl at the time that I filed suit, died in a Vermont hospital of an undisclosed disease. The next morning, I was to give my last deposition in front of my lawyers and the lawyers for the Archdiocese of Burlington, Vermont. It turned out, I may have been the first person in the state to bring public charges of this kind against the Church. But my case opened up the floodgates and the ghosts of children who were sexually traumatized by this same priest and by other Catholic clergy came forward by the hundreds and told the truth of what had happened to them. Cases are still continuing in Vermont and all around the world.
I wanted my day in court. But after Judge Murtha threw my case out as being too old, it was settled anyway. The evidence produced made my position one of certitude. The Church realized there was no murkiness about the facts, so they decided to give me $50,000. My lawyers suggested that I take the money because we might not win on appeal. At the time, I thought this was the best thing to do. So, I agreed. The deal was that I was to keep my mouth shut and never tell a soul. I took the $50,000 but I refused to keep quiet about what had happened to me. I paid my attorneys, who had helped me on a pro bono basis, $24,000. With the remaining $26,000, I started up my life again.
By God’s grace, I am finally a whole person. I have good work as a writer; I have a roof over my head, sobriety, and my family of origin has embraced me now that they understand what happened to me. Every day I get down on my knees and thank the Lord God Almighty for giving me back an entire heart. Where there was once a mutilated little stump, I have a regenerated organ, bursting with love. My mother and I are the best of friends today. My children are a part of my life once more. I have grand children, a huge extended family of friends, and others who are surviving their own living Hells—a day at a time. But most important of all, perhaps, I have my Precious Self. Thank you, God, for everything!
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Poet and journalist Terry Reis Kennedy can be contacted at treiskennedy@gmail.com
