Horrific, Awful, Nightmarish....

Updated 6/8 below

It was misting last Tuesday morning when I headed out for my morning walk with Alby.  Another grey day to add to the many we've already had in May.  I checked email on my work phone when I got back to see a message indicating that a coworker had died unexpectedly.  The opening paragraph about his final days set off my radar that maybe he had died in some sort of freak accident, but there were no details.  I don't want to use his real name in order to protect his family so I'll call him Ward since I don't know anyone with that name.

Ward had been arrested for possessing child pornography, his mug shot and arrest details appeared in his local paper and a few days later he took his own life.

Never in a million years would I have had any inkling he'd do something like this.  Ward and I were not close.  His office was down the hall from mine and we spoke some times about sports like soccer, or just in general office banter if we happened to land in the same meeting.  Ward was a nice looking man, clean cut, smart and hard working.  All week everyone in the office has been in a bit of a shock. How do we reconcile the man we knew with what he did?

Yesterday I binge watched "The Keepers" on Netflix.  Once I started I couldn't turn it off.  Unlike the movie "Spotlight" which came out in 2015, "The Keepers" goes in to more detail regarding the abuse that was suffered by the young women at Archbishop Keough.  When I was finished watching I had a need to know more, see if there were any updates, and find out if Brother Bob had been identified.  I started reading Tom Nugent's articles on Inside Baltimore.  Nugent is a former reporter for the Baltimore Sun and he's written extensively on the Sister Cathy murder.

I may have read too much.  If the young women at Archbishop Keough were living in a nightmare, the kids at the Catholic Middle School in Locust Point were living in hell on earth.  I won't share the details, you can go ahead and read Nugent's articles on your own.  When I was done I felt like throwing up.

I'm not Catholic, I'm not even a religious person, but I'm furious with an institution where so many of my friends and relatives claim a membership.  Just like I was furious for the Penn State cover up a few years back.  What kind of a world are we living in where young, innocent victims are sacrificed so readily?  Over the years I've read the stories of the lifelong trauma victims of abuse suffer.  Some of them are able to live fairly normal lives as adults and confront what happened to them, refusing to let the abuser have anymore power.  Some though turn to alcohol, drugs and even suicide.  They feel guilty for something that was never their fault, that was done to them, that they never asked for.  They were just kids doing kid stuff when someone started them on this hellish journey.

"The Keepers" provides details that one of the abuser Priests had kept records of his victims, including photographs of half naked young girls.  I wonder if Ward realized when he was buying his online child porn the nightmare that the kids in the photograph were living in?  I'm not saying Ward looked at the Priest's pictures, but he did look at someone's.

When my Mom sent my brother off to nursery school in 1980 she told him that no one was ever allowed to touch him, ever, without his permission.  At Show & Tell on the first day the kids were asked if anyone had anything they wanted to share.  My brother stood up, "No one can touch your penis without your permission."  We get a family laugh out of it, but what my Mother did was uber important.  She also told him that if anyone tried to do that he needed to tell her immediately, no matter what.  I don't think parents prior to that had any idea they should be sending their kids off to school with that warning.

When I was coaching soccer about 12 years ago, several parents always hung around to help out.  Good.  Never leave your kid unattended with an adult for long periods of time.  If a parent was late picking a kid up after practice I never offered the kid a ride home.  Instead, we'd sit waiting by the parking lot in plain sight until the parent finally showed.  The kids all had cell phones by then too so they always called the late parent to find out where they were.   Don't be the parent who picks their kid up late from practice.  As a matter of fact, don't be the parent who picks your kid up late ever from anywhere.  Especially in the evening when places are closing up and your kid might be all alone and easy prey.

I hope one day the Catholic Church, Penn State and other institutions who have protected themselves over their victims, come to realize and openly acknowledge the harm they've done.  I hope that the survivors and their families find the peace they are seeking.

UPDATE 6/8
For anyone interested in gaining additional understanding on what's happening with the investigation in to the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, I suggest joining the Facebook group page,  The Keepers Official Group - Justice for Catherine Cesnik and Joyce Malecki.  On the sex abuse scandals of the Catholic Church, Alex Gibney's 2012 HBO documentary, Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God is very well done.  Finally, Richard Sipe who is referenced in the movie Spotlight, and appears in The Keepers,  also has his own web page discussing much of his research and linking to others who have been trying to get the church to do what's right.