Breaking The Silence

The sex abuse scandal of the Roman Catholic Church has hit an all time high, reaching all the way up to the Chair of Peter, Pope Benedict XVI himself. I have remained silent until recently on how close to home this issue hits for me. I am a survivor of clergy sex abuse which began for me at age eleven.
I was an altar boy who had his sights set on priesthood from as early as I can remember. I was raised in the Church by a very pious Polish Momma and the priest for me represented the ultimate of role models. He was everything I had aspired to be from a very early age. I was one of twenty four grandchildren and the "chaplain" when we played Church as children. I arranged a vast array of liturgical services ranging from the Mass to more elaborate May Crownings of the Blessed Virgin Mary statue that stood in the middle of Momma's birdbath, outside her kitchen window. The procession began in the kitchen, out the side door, Momma then my cousins, Kelly with the homemade crown made of flowers and me in my makeshift vestments in the rear bellowing "Immaculate Mary" at the top of my lungs. There was no greater joy for me than these moments with my cousins. Everyone was always happy to take part, however often I would officiate.
So when I became an altar boy I could not be close enough to the priests I served Mass for. Whatever he asked of me was never a problem. Even if it were something I would feel so much shame and awkward confusion for, it would get filed into the recesses off my mind, so the pain would not disable me from functioning. Well even though it did not totally disable me, it had a terrible impact, one my mother saw and would make numerous attempts at trying to help me come to terms with. She bore the pain for me at that time, watching her son isolate and at times become emotionally unavailable. Her hands were tied, I would not even admit to myself it was happening let alone to her and in the 1980's there was little publicity on the topic. To be continued...