IGNORING THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM...YOUR ROOM

By Tim Rohr

In a recent self-described "rant," Kandit News host, Troy Torres, "ranted" about how "the church" systematically used its power and influence to cover up decades of sex abuse within its ranks. 

In my opinion, and as the one primarily to blame for uncovering this "coverup," Troy gives "the church" too much credit and the people and culture of Guam not enough.

To illustrate this we need look no farther than what has continued to occur in Guam nearly a decade after the church's sins were exposed.

According to a 2021 story in the Guam Daily Post, the Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Family Violence, a local organization, "the percentage of minors sexually assaulted on Guam has risen from 69% of reported cases in 2018 to 71% in 2019, and to 75% in 2020," and  "about 1,000 child abuse cases were referred to Child Protective Services in 2020, an increase of nearly 5%."

According to the same story, the rate actually decreased a bit in 2020, but according to Governor Lou Leon Guerrero, that dip was an "anomaly" which the governor credited to underreporting due to the Covid lockdown at the time. 

Remember now, Apuron had already been ousted in 2016 and was found guilty and permanently banned from Guam by 2018. Given the "scare" we put into the church leadership, there have been no reported cases of child sexual abuse since then (other than old claims), but meanwhile, the local population has continued to abuse its own children at an increasingly devastating rate.

Despite there being an occasional clergy abuser from the outside (e.g. Louis Brouillard), they were only "occasional." The majority of abusers over all these decades were local clergy from local families. In my opinion, what happened in the Church, and especially why it was never exposed, is because it was just an extension of what was already happening in local families for generations, and, as the above facts demonstrate, is still happening. 

(Note: This observation should be no surprise. I've lived in Guam for nearly 40 years and have heard of this sort of thing happening many times. Guam isn't unique. Most sex abuse cases, especially of children, no matter where, are by someone known to the victim, and almost always a family member.)

Of course, this excuses no one, and I am glad we've at least been able to get rid of some of the more cancerous clergy. However, aiming only at the mostly past sins of the church and crediting its leadership for masterminding decades of coverup when all they were really doing was stumbling along is ignoring the elephant in the room...your room. 

And then there is one final fact that the governor loves to ignore: A culture which slays its own while still in the womb is more likely to abuse them once they leave it.

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