This Pope Gives Me The Creeps!!!

I have never been anti-Catholic, but for some reason this guy really makes my skin crawl

GARY BERGERON FOR BUZZFLASH.COM

This weekend, BuzzFlash posted a statement by a Boston survivor of church sexual abuse as a child, Gary Bergeron, in response to the recent revelations of international cases of large scale pedophilia by priests and inaction by Pope Benedict. Gary told BuzzFlash, in a call we made to confirm authorship, that he was not looking toward the past; he wanted the Vatican to sincerely commit and take action to prevent any child from experiencing sexual abuse at the hands of priests now and in the future.  On Monday, Gary E-Mailed BuzzFlash his response to Pope Benedict's Palm Sunday remarks concerning the latest outbreak of child sexual abuse revelations crossing several countries.

Yesterday, Pope Benedict stated that he “Will not be intimidated…” by accusations against the Vatican, by what he calls “Petty  gossip…” related to the clerical sex abuse crisis. These comments are grave reminders of the lack of understanding that the leader of the Catholic Church continues to have surrounding childhood sexual abuse by clergy.
Offensive, would be an understatement to describe yesterday’s comments. It is beyond belief that words like “intimidation” and “petty gossip” are being used today in defense of the most important issue continuing to face the Catholic Church. Intimidation and petty gossip are words that I and other survivors know well. These are words that were used to dismiss the stories of victims of childhood clergy abuse for decades. These remarks were used less than one week after Pope Benedict’s words of apology.  Yesterday, in an effort to dismiss the words of his critics, Pope Benedict has dismissed his own words of apology.

In choosing those words yesterday,  Pope Benedict missed an opportunity to work with victims of childhood clergy sexual abuse in answering the question “What are we going to do now?” This question needs to be answered not only for childhood clergy abuse survivors, but for every parent, grandparent & child around the world.

In June of 2003, I received a letter from then Cardinal Joseph Ratinger’s office stating “His Eminence Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger has asked me to respond to …..he has asked me to let you know that the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, of which he is the Prefect, is absolutely committed to doing everything possible so that such crimes do not happen again."

As a survivor of clergy of abuse, as the brother of a survivor of clergy abuse, and as the son of a clergy abuse survivor, I do not ask Pope Benedict to replace the lost years of my youth. Today I ask him to, as he put in his own words almost 7 years ago: “Do everything possible so that such crimes do not happen again."  I’m not sure that the words he spoke yesterday, served that purpose.

Gary Bergeron is a clergy abuse survivor from the Greater Boston area who traveled to the Vatican with his father, also a survivor of clergy abuse, in 2003.  He is the author of “Don’t Call Me A Victim, Faith, Hope & Sexual abuse in the Catholic Church." He is currently working on his next book titled: “Finding Peace, One Man's Journey.”

There is nothing civil about civil wars!