Priest adulterous act leads to basis of anti-faith beliefs

Christian church

"I don't like churches, especially Christian ones.  I would rather be someone who tries to be good and not try to get involved in something that just causes trouble for people."

Where is the source of these feelings? Perhaps they are at the heart of many people who have rejected churches, based on what happened in families over generations ago, that linger today in the memories of those who reject religion.

The heart of the Catholic church at Easter may be pierced with arrows of criticism, but the thrashing about from its wounds may be nothing compared to the pain of a family, suffering generations from a priest's adultery.

And with Christmas stories bringing up the stories of Christians and the role of the church in man's progress, there are often stories surrounding the holidays that show the problems too.

One of those stories relates the issues of adultery, that is the priest's involvements with women, sometimes married women, that led to disgrace, divorce and often a family distaste for Catholicism or for the whole of Christianity.

These stories should be related to show that that is what they are: illustrations of how man goes wrong in his religious practices, even if the man is a religious person or pastor.  For there are stories as well of Protestant ministers who were "outed" all while preaching against gays and ministers who frequented prostitutes while preaching against sin of all kinds.

In this case a 93-year-old woman told a story, in the ways an elder can do, of a family racked by anguish for many years. The gentle lady, whose name cannot be used for purposes of family concerns, her age and status, declared how awful it was when a priest disobeyed his vows and created a terrible incident that has affected whole generations of a family.

 
Today's news speaks of priests and sexual abuse, of cover-ups by religious authority. Most of this news concerns abuse of the young. But there have been priests who have used their relationships and power to seduce young women, some to a very sad end. So it was with a young woman whose story was told by her niece who was 12 years old at the time and an old woman of more than nine decades today.

The woman was young by the years of today but mature in the days of the story, and at age 38 had an affair with a priest. She was married and had five children. The elder who related this looked up with great sorrow as she told of this woman's dilemma.

The young woman became pregnant with the priest's child and in her shame tried to abort the child, then died following this, leaving her husband a widower and her children without a mother.

What was the family's great sorrow? The old woman lifted her head and recalled. "Her young children were left to struggle on their own with only their father who had to work and be gone much of the time. They were left without the guidance of someone they loved. They grew up knowing how their mother had died painfully at a very young age. As each child got older, he or she learned about what had happened with the priest. The story was told to one, then the other, as each child became an adult. It was sad; it still is."

Generations moved on, and as time passed the story faded; but the memory of religious wrongs remained, sufficient for many in the family to entirely reject Christianity, although some never really knew why.

The why was unfolded by an old woman, with tears still stinging her eyes. She had watched the young woman die in great sorrow, and with sorrow the old woman ended her story with these words, "The evil seems never to end."

A grandson considers the Easter holiday and looks with eyes filled with tears, "I have never felt at home in a church, but I couldn't understand fully until now. Perhaps I may never be happy in church knowing my family's deep hurt and its source that continues today."

The head of the German Catholic Church, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch of Freiburg said on Good Friday. "The church is appalled by the harm done to victims who were often unable to speak about their pain for decades, he said.

"Wounds were inflicted that are hardly curable," the bishop added.

And such wounds as occurred in a family generations ago offers a reason for some of the anti-religious sentiments offered by family members now and perhaps others for whom those wounds "are hardly curable."