STICKY EVIL

By Tim Rohr

Every once in a while, someone thanks me for "standing up for the victims" (of clergy sex abuse). I am grateful for their kind words. However, whenever it happens I am always reminded of just how dirty, filthy, and sticky evil it all was. I say "sticky evil" because you can't engage evil of that magnitude without having some of that filth "stick" to you. 

The bottom line was that in engaging this filthy mess, those of us who got involved disturbed legions of demons who had been having their way in Guam for decades. It was like disturbing a hornets nest. And the hornets, even ten years later, are still vengefully mad.

A few months ago, I published the post EXORCISMS NEEDED.  In the post, I made the case that exorcisms are needed on the many places (churches, schools, rectories, etc.) where so many of these atrocities upon the bodies, minds, and souls of so many children (and some adults) were committed, and where "the hornets" still angrily swarm. 

And, given that so many of these crimes were committed in consecrated and blessed spaces (such as sacristies and rectories), these were crimes of sacrilege. 

One particularly horrific account of such a crime occurring in a rectory was made public by Ramon De Plata. I can't even reprint it here, it is so horrific and filthy. Mr. De Plata went public with his story on KUAM in 2016. The full text of his statement is also available here. 

In his statement, Mr. De Plata names the parishes of Agat, Barrigada, Mangilao, and Chalan Pago where perverted atrocities, known to Mr. De Plata, occurred. We also know that many occurred in the rectory and the sacristy at the Malojloj parish which was "pastored" by the infamous and now late Fr. Louis Brouillard. 

We also now know, from the many testimonies, that these sex crimes against children in our diocese occurred over decades, so it is quite probable that no church or school or otherwise church-related property has been left untainted by this pervasive and soul-destroying evil. 

From what I was told, the late Archbishop Byrnes would not even move into the archbishop's house at the chancery until he exorcised the place. We know of at least one atrocity which occurred there: the rape of Mark Apuron by his "Uncle Tony" in the archbishop's bathroom while members of Mark's family were just feet away in another room:

"He asked, 'What are you doing?'" Mark Apuron said. He said he froze, afraid of what trouble he was in, when his uncle allegedly pulled down his pants and pushed him onto the vanity. The teen thought he was going to get a whipping for smoking and drinking but instead, he said, his uncle raped him. SOURCE

We also know from Leo Tudela, that the St. Fidelis Friary was the scene of some terrible, sex-saturated crimes against boys who lived there, who, as in Leo's case, were often boys from Saipan who had come to Guam for their education.

Maybe because I was drawn into the sticky evil of it all. Maybe because I heard so many stories from the victims themselves - including those who didn't sue but just wanted someone to hear what had happened to them. Maybe because "the hornets" particularly stung me and members of my family in angry retaliation for my role in upsetting their decades-old nests. Maybe because of all that, I am particularly sensitized to "the hornets" when I am in physical proximity to some of those places and can "smell" the evil, can feel "it" on the skin of my soul. I don't know how else to describe it.

In any event, I have learned how to protect myself with rosaries and the sacraments, but I know the hornets are still in those places. Swarming. Stinging. Poisoning. Don't think that a few bucks thrown at the victims and a couple days of clergy recollection has wrought real reparation, especially for the decades of sacrilegious crimes wreaked upon those hundreds, if not thousands, of young souls. 

Exorcisms are needed. At least to start.