#23 || AN UNCOMMON CONVERSATION ABOUT CLERGY SEX ABUSE
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Transcripts may contain errors, and audio should be checked before quoting in print.
[00:00:00]
STEPHANIE
For those of you who heard reckonings episode 21 featuring Anwen and Sameer and episode 22 featuring an imaginary Pope Francis, I was not planning to come right back to the topic of sexual abuse, but Susan and Gil were willing to share their story with us and it is just too potent and to timely not to tell.
This time I'm going to put the content warning up front. What you're about to hear contains non-consensual sexual activity. It's not graphic and it's not violent, but it is non-consensual. And with that, this is Reckonings. An exploration of how we change our hearts and Minds. I'm Stephanie Lepp and this is Susan:
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SUSAN
it's a little bit like a fish talking about water [00:01:00] because it's so mundane isn't the right word, but ever present our faith.
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STEPHANIE
And this is Gil:
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GIL
about the time, I was maybe nine years old. I started articulating that I thought I wanted to be a priest. My image of priesthood was kind of a community organizer in church is where the parishioners are nourished and fed in order for them to go out into the world and do the work of the church and the world bringing the message of love and compassion out into the world.
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STEPHANIE
Gil and Susan grew up in the Twin Cities. they both went to Catholic schools. At the beginning of Susan's junior year of high school. She gave a presentation that to all incoming faculty.
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SUSAN
I was wearing a black shirt [00:02:00] with a very long collar because it was the 70s and jumper that I borrowed from my oldest sister and you know, I felt pretty cool.
When I exited the Little Theater there was, you know kind of cookies and Juice sort of around and people were mingling and a new teacher was there and came up to me and began talking to me about my presentation.
She was cheerful. And forthcoming and bright and one thing I remember is I had to keep backing up because…I felt she was much closer than minnesotans usually stood so I kept backing up and eventually I was back against the wall.
She kept finding me [00:03:00] in school and asking me to come and have lunch with her in a room and I had a book of poetry - a book of Yevtushenko’s poetry.
Actually. I remember the poem. I was reading Babi Yar and I had it with my books in the student council room and she said oh you're reading poetry and I said yes and. I think she asked me if I knew who EE Cummings was and I did and I think she shared a poem with me like out of memory and I was very impressed because you know memorizing poem is impressive and I remember the poem.
I think of Olaf glad and big. yeah, it was an anti-war poem.
Well I was impressed God I was you know, there was this sort of heroic [00:04:00] person. I had a lot of respect for teachers and I thought a lot of the and. I knew she was a former nun. And I often not thought I might want to be one.
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STEPHANIE
Meanwhile Gill did become a priest.
He was ordained at age 26 and assigned to a parish just outside st. Paul. Gil arrived in mid-june, but on the fourth of July the head priest had a heart attack and for whatever reason the Archdiocese didn't send in a temporary administrator. They decided that 26 year-old Gil, one month ordained, could cover the work of two priests and single-handedly run a parish of a thousand families.
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GIL
I discovered I'd love to preach and the feedback I got was that I was good at it, you know when the hardest of moments at death [00:05:00] a suicide a family war or joyous moments, like weddings baptisms birth of children. It's like I had. I was given full entree to share people's lives in the most important moments and I was in love with it.
But it was exhausting. I just remember kind of always doing something. It was like okay here. I am another couple to get ready for marriage all here. We are another couple at struggling with their marriage all here. We are I'm doing baptism preparation. So it was like a lot of things to do constant stream of things to do.
I just felt like man, what do I get? I give and I give and I give and what do I get? What I started to get was sexual fantasy [00:06:00] and the sexual fantasy. Focused on boys in the parish. I think when I was about 21 and a senior in college was when I realized that I had this sexual attraction to boys and I was getting older and these boys were staying about the same age 12 13 14 years old.
I would feel like you know, it's okay. I'm doing all this hard work. So it's okay. If I do this fantasy if I masturbate to this fantasy.
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SUSAN
She asked me if I would go out to supper with her
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STEPHANIE
Susan had been spending more and more time with that new teacher.
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SUSAN
I said I could you know, [00:07:00] I. Ask my parents if I could and they thought that would be okay. I remember the restaurant we went to and.
she gave me this book of poetry. by EE Cummings. and then when we were going to go out. I remember walking out and going to the parking lot and. Getting in the car and her saying to me. Are we friends? Well, I said yeah, and she said Can friends do anything with friends and I said, well, I guess I think so and. she laid down on top of me and kissed me.
I had not done any kissing.
[00:08:00] Up to then.
and she quit when some restaurant worker came out to empty the trash in the dumpster in front of the car. We were parked at and looked in. and subsequent to that. Drove me to her home. I said my folks won't I can't stay overnight? My folks won't let me stay overnight and she said I'll tell him it's okay.
And I said, I don't I don't think I should stay overnight but it was far away from where I was another suburb. So it was not where I lived. And so I went downstairs.
[00:09:00] and she continued from where she left off in the car.
I remember laying there and I remember being scared. I remember thinking what the hell this other person thinks. It's okay to touch me. All over my body. And I don't understand what's going on it and I don't understand why we're not sleeping. I don't understand why she's kissing me grabbing me putting her hands in my pants.
My understanding of what she was doing was Sexual intercourse which is, you know [00:10:00] something I'd read about.
I was terrified that I was in a situation that somehow I must be responsible for but I had no control over. That somehow all along the way I must have done something wrong.
I didn't hit her. I didn't fight back. I didn't do any of that. My brain was on fire.
And I got up. In from the bed and walked out into the hall and went into the bathroom. And I found a razor and then I thought. Catholics can kill themselves and I went back into the bedroom.
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GIL
I was [00:11:00] on a field trip with a group of the Altar Boys at the parish and we went to a local amusement park and there was oh, I don't know 20 25 boys and probably two or three adults in myself as the chaperones and there was this one boy.
And he was one of the altar servers these were all altar servers and he was kind of a Clinger a needy kid in a way and so he was hanging out with me the whole day and on one of the rides we were in a. Car together or whatever and I slipped my hand between his legs. And you know, he didn't object to it.
And [00:12:00] so as the day when I run these various rides and more often than not there to person rides. So I kept doing it and and feeling his his penis. And. in the fact that he didn't seem to respond negatively said to me that he must be okay with it.
I knew it was wrong to do that. That I was taking advantage. This kid had served Mass was pretty clear. You know, he liked me looked up to me.
There's a certain sense of danger too well. What if he reacts negatively. What if he tells one of the adults? Oh my God, then what? You know I shouldn't be doing this I shouldn't be doing this.
[00:13:00] And afterwards, you know when I got home that night it was like oh my god. What have I done? This is awful.
He was probably like 13, maybe 14. I would have been about 20 29 maybe 30.
The urge was constant. The urge to have sexual interaction with these young teenage boys either I would push against it or not. But the urge was constant the acting on the Urge was more sporadic. [00:14:00] Some of it was dependent on availability. You know what I'd be with with a boy where I could you know, give him a hug and maybe get us a sneak, you know squeeze in her touches but or whatever.
The certainly wasn't a month that went by that. I didn't have to maybe three instances of some kind of inappropriate Touch of boys.
What I knew was that this wasn't right. I didn't delude myself into thinking I'm teaching this boy about sex or. Not even necessarily that you know that this is something he likes.
Was I curious about it, did I want [00:15:00] to learn about it? Well, no, I was mostly ashamed it's like you know, why why am I having this sexual attraction?
Yeah, so wasn't it wasn't a lot of Consciousness around this there's a ton of suppression going on. I didn't want it and I was trying to get rid of it and I was trying to push it down which just kept feeding it. I felt awful that I was doing this and yet it just felt like I can't stop
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SUSAN
I took on that it was my fault.
I can't go to school. I feel sick all the time. I'm in school. I feel sick. I'm with my family. I feel sick. I'm with her. I feel sick. [00:16:00] I feel crazy and I and I feel trapped.
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STEPHANIE
One night over the summer Gil went to the house of the boy. He'd abused at the amusement park who had become his primary victim
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GIL
and I drove over to his house and his parents were there and so I chatted with his parents and he was sleeping. out on a portrait least he that's. You can kind of claim that space is a place for him to sleep and he was already out there.
So I chatted with his folks for a while and he had come into the house at some point knew I was there and he said to me I want, you know, come on see me before you go. And I'm thinking okay. So now it's [00:17:00] literally it's probably about 9:30 10:00 at night. And so I go onto the porch and he had a little cot on the porch and he touched me in my groin and
and I. He asked me he asked me if I would lie down with him on this cot. And I said no I can't do that. I was terribly afraid of you know, what would happen if his parents came out in the two of us are lying on his cot. And so I was at that point. I just need to get out of here and he you know.
Kind of reached for my my pants [00:18:00] my groin. but I offered to give him a blowjob and. but he said he wanted to give me a blowjob and. And I'm like, oh my God, this is craziness. So but he did start that and I was sitting on a chair next to this cut and I was holding his head. and
so I. You know, I thought man I got to get out of here. And I did stop him. It was like mostly out of fear. I mean, it's like my God at Any moment is [00:19:00] parents could come out to see why what's taking you so long so I stopped it. And said, I've got to go. You know zipped up my pants and snuck out to my car.
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STEPHANIE
Let's just be really clear that not fighting a sexual advance from another person, and even enjoying it, and even soliciting it does not necessarily imply consent. Under circumstances in which one party is underage And there is a major asymmetry of power - which was the case for both Gil and Susan - there may be no such thing as meaningful consent.
Susan ran away to Omaha. She [00:20:00] took a bus and spent the rest of her money on a motel. And woke up the next morning to realize it was too cold to hitchhike any farther. She was scared to be so far away from home by herself. And so she called a friend who then called the teacher. Her friend had no reason not to - everyone knew they were closed (including Susan's parents who the teacher had told she'd kept Susan overnight for extended counseling).
And the teacher volunteered herself to pick Susan up in Omaha, Nebraska and bring her home to st. Paul, Minnesota. Of course, it was jarring to be getting in her teacher's car, but Susan was relieved to be going home.
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SUSAN
I fell asleep in the car. I thought we'd get home about after supper is [00:21:00] all I had encoded.
By that time my folks knew I was coming. I woke up and we were pulling into her driveway not my folks driveway.
and. she said I just can't drive anymore. Took me into the same house the same bedroom.
And I know that there was sexual activity of that night. I know that it happened and I don't remember it at the same time. I laid in the bed. I didn't sleep. I was afraid. I knew I couldn't stop this. I knew that in her bathroom was a razor. And I went in to that bathroom. And I took the razor and I cut my [00:22:00] left wrist with it.
I wanted out. I didn't want to kill myself, but I didn't know how to get out.
I was bleeding. And she must have awakened. Came to the to the bathroom door and knocked. and. I opened the door and when she looked in and she saw the razor and she saw my wrist and she said give me your wrist and bound it up.
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STEPHANIE
Susan didn't sleep that night. And in the morning, her abuser finally took her home.
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SUSAN
the bandage was full of blood. [00:23:00] I had not shown my folks, but my mother saw it…My mother's a nurse. my mother put her arm around me and said Susie. We're going to take you to the hospital because we've got to do something to keep you.
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STEPHANIE
Not long after the incident on the porch, Gil got an invitation to meet with the vicar General. Basically the second in command to the bishop.
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GIL
So I walked in to his office and sat down and the vicar General hands to me a letter and said I'd like you to read this. [00:24:00] And it was addressed to me. And it was written by my primary victim.
And in it he was he described some of the sexual behavior we had engaged in. But I read it.
And I hand the letter back to the vicar General and he pauses. And then he says well, what do you have to say?
I could deny this. I'm I'm a very believable credible person in this 15 16 year old boy could be disbelieved and I could I could say oh no. I have no idea what he's talking about. Am I going to deny this letter? [00:25:00] Or am I going to acknowledge that what this boy is saying is true.
I don't want to keep running away from this it's time to turn and face what I have done no matter what the consequences are.
And so I when I handed the letter back in the asked, what did I have to say? I said to him it's true.
And then he says well you're going to need to probably talk to the Archbishop about this and they'll be some steps will have to take and and I said, okay. So I walked out of the Chancery and got into my car, which was a tiny little Dodge Colt a little tin can of a car. And I got on Interstate 94 heading east out of st.
[00:26:00] Paul. And was driving at 70 miles an hour. And I thought to myself I could just turn this car into a bridge abutment and would seem like an accident and I'd be dead.
Because I thought everything that mattered to me. The priesthood that I love so much. Was going to be gone. I couldn't imagine that anyone my family or friends anyone could hear of this behavior and think of me as anything but a piece of shit. Think of me as anything but despicable. And so I thought well what if I just put an end to it?
I kept driving and driving and driving and 15 20 miles later is at the Wisconsin border [00:27:00] and by now that the impetus to kill myself had quieted and I turned around and drove back to the place where I was living and try to figure out what's next.
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SUSAN
I was not telling the psychiatrist what had gone on. I did not tell my folks what had gone on well, and I couldn't betray her. She had told me that terrible things would happen to her. She would go to prison and I didn't want to be responsible for for her going to prison.
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STEPHANIE
Susan spent most of the fall and the beginning of winter in the psych ward at the hospital where she was given a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. shortly before Christmas 1970, She was released from the hospital to the custody of her parents and went [00:28:00] home.
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SUSAN
and when I got back to school after Christmas the teacher was gone. My abuser was no longer teaching there.
I enjoyed school. I loved being sort of involved in student government. I was very interested in leadership kinds of activities and. And I quit them all when I got back to school. Everybody walked on eggshells because they didn't know what I would do next because of course. They didn't know what had happened in the first place.
I lost the easy intimacy that I had with my siblings and my parents but they it all got shattered. [00:29:00] Everybody watched me like when is she going to take a razor to herself next?
I had no joy, I had no energy. I had difficulty sleeping. I had intrusive thoughts. I was was having a hard time getting up and going to class. And and I just couldn't I couldn't I couldn't make I couldn't put it together and I couldn't I couldn't make it work.
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GIL
Who I knew myself to be prior to August of 1982 was this talented up-and-coming bright boy priests who could do anything and proved it by running a parish two weeks ordained.
All that was gone. And now it's who the hell am I?
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STEPHANIE
Who Gil was was a highly publicized [00:30:00] convicted felon. During his five-year tenure at the parish, he’d abused for boys ranging from 10 to 15 years old. He was sentenced to one and a half years in state prison plus 10 years of supervised probation.
He also went into therapy. He started reading accounts of victims of sexual abuse to learn about the kind of impact he had on his own victims and friends who themselves were victims started reaching out to him asking for help understanding why someone would do something like this.
Susan had started drinking, heavily. She'd had another stay in a psych ward and was now on her second attempt at College.
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SUSAN
I was living in an apartment above a store in Morris Minnesota while I was attending college there. [00:31:00] I believe it was late fall kind of mid-afternoon when I got a phone call. and.
When I picked up the phone and answered it there was silence for a moment. And then I heard this hello. I'm going to be coming to Morris tomorrow. and I took me a minute to recognize the voice, but my body probably recognized it before I did because I remember sliding down the wall and sitting down on the floor.
And. I said. coming here for what? and she went on to tell me something about she was in the area for work and wanted to see me.
[00:32:00] Finally I said no, I just said no. and she proceeded to. Tell me that we could go out to dinner. She take me to dinner. And I just said no, don't call me again and then I hung up.
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STEPHANIE
Susan's teacher had abused her through the end of high school and for another four years afterwards, but after that phone call the abuse stopped.
Susan finally went into rehab and it was her counselor who introduced her to an idea. She had never considered
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SUSAN
she said. You were abused. Really my jaw kind of hit my knees, and I just looked at her. It was [00:33:00] for a moment that somebody thought it was somebody else's fault and I've been thinking it was my fault.
It was really Thunderish, kinda. In a good way. And it freed me to start dealing with what had happened to me and calling it by name. Oh, no, that's not how this story goes. This is how the story goes. You are not the author of this story anymore. I am.
I was angry. I walked a fine line for a while.
I started reading the Bible for one. I was reading about grief and sorrow and redemption and hope.
[00:34:00] there has to be Redemption after horror. There has to be a way to repair. restorative justice is everywhere in the Christian and the Hebrew tradition as well
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STEPHANIE
Although not by that name restorative justice is everywhere in the Christian and Jewish traditions because it embodies Christian and Jewish values.
Of mercy and forgiveness and Redemption. by that name restorative justice is a response to Crime that engages offenders and victims in repairing the harm that was caused. Susan knew she wanted to learn more and so she dove into the literature and got a local Professor to Mentor her. And started going to trainings on restorative justice.
[00:35:00] When Gil got out of jail, he couldn't go back to being a priest in a setting where there were kids around. So he started doing administrative work for the Archdiocese, but he was offered a position as a priest in a monastery of nuns where he had no contact with children and everyone knew his story.
He actually told his story to the entire community of nuns.
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GIL
So I laid out the abusive behavior and all this and sisters. Listen very quietly and very, Patiently and kindly and then all of a sudden they were breaking kind of they were going back to the inside the monastery Into The Cloister and one of the sisters stopped and tugged on my arm and said Gil, thank you for for sharing all that and being so honest and so straightforward said, you know, you [00:36:00] probably look at us and think here's this bunch of holy ladies.
Well, we all have stories too.
One day the rectory phone rings, you know, so I pick it up and I say, you know, hello St. Peters and on the other end is my primary victim. And what he said was I want to I want to I want to talk with you.
And you said I want I want I want to get together with you and want you to see me.
He said I forgive you.
I'm sorry. This is my fault. You didn't do anything wrong. That's the message I would have liked to have been able to give. [00:37:00]
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STEPHANIE
The terms of Gil’s probation meant that there was no way he could meet with his primary victim.
Soon after that phone call Gil was invited to speak at a conference on sex abuse in religious settings. right before it was his turn to speak a young man told his own story about being abused by an Episcopalian priest.
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GIL
So he finished and then it was my turn to speak. And I walked up there and walked to the podium and I thought oh God, these folks have just heard this incredibly painful story, you know, here's the guy the causes that kind of pain gonna talk.
And I remember the young man took his place kind of right in front of the podium. So I'm staring right at him as I'm giving my. My account my talk, and I remember speaking directly to him. [00:38:00] and saying. You know that I am sorry. He had been abused as one who had abused boys myself. I was sorry that he had been abused.
And that I wanted him to know that it had never been his fault. There are moments when you're speaking, giving a talk or preaching, when the room gets very quiet. And you can almost hear or feel people listening. And that's what was happening. When I apologized to this young man for the pain that had been caused to him almost in the room was really dialed in.
When I was sexually acting out, when I was abusing boys, I would have these moments of being afraid of what happens if somebody finds out I'm doing this. [00:39:00] I was afraid of consequences like being thrown out of priesthood. perhaps having to deal with the police in the court system. And then I'd kind of creep up on my fear.
But oh my God, what if I go to jail? What if this gets in the press and then everybody knows? You know that I haven't been thrown out of priesthood. But the other consequences all came true. And they were painful. But each and every one had a gift. Having the court of law judge. My behavior was liberating.
Well, it was painful to be in jail it to became a gift. a penalty was imposed and I fulfilled that penalty. And while, I'm sure [00:40:00] there are some for whom I represent despicable behavior and they would wish I didn't exist, I discovered that there were quite a number of people in my life who could hear of this and Support me and still love me still stay in relationship with me. I did this. it's nobody's fault, but mine. I misused my position of power to get my needs met. and I must accept responsibility. And once we do that once we accept our own personal responsibility. You can say okay, now I've got to change.
Holding people responsible and getting them to understand what it is that got them there where the way they are, That's the place [00:41:00] of change. Don't spare your offenders their consequences. don't spare the consequences. You're doing your offenders no favors. The consequences can be the path to heal and become whole.
So I finished and I could tell people were really hearing me and there was Applause and it was time for lunch. So I got off the podium and the young man was still standing there and. Some people were chatting with him and some people were chatting with me and he turned to me and he said thank you for what you said.
Would it be okay if we hugged? And I said, oh, yes. And we did.
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STEPHANIE
[00:42:00] Meanwhile, Susan was looking for her own restorative encounter. She reached out to the religious order that her abuser had been part of as a nun. But eventually they just got their Law Firm to make her go away. And so she contacted the Archdiocese which had employed her abuser as a teacher at a Catholic High School and still had some degree of jurisdiction over her. This time she got a meeting with the vicar General Kevin McDonough.
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SUSAN
and he said do you want to meet with this person? And I said, yes I do.
I remember the whole week before the meeting. I worried I fretted I didn't sleep I had nightmares. I wondered if I was going to quit on myself. I chose my clothing. [00:43:00] I wore my best power suit from my professional life. and. Made a copy with big enough print and some space between so I could read the what I had to say because I knew it was going to be very difficult to do and so I knew I'd have to read it.
She walked into the room with a winter coat on. Kevin sat her down across the other side of the table and he sat at the head of the table and he kind of made some introductory remarks. And he said then Susan is going to talk about whatever she has to say to you and then I went ahead and I spoke.
I was shaky. [00:44:00] I didn't break down. I didn't cry. It wasn't really being taken in. It was sort of being survived. like she was just sort of showing up but not really there.
and eventually she said.
I'm sorry that this happened to you.
Which I thought was an odd way to put it because she wasn't taking any responsibility.
She had no sorrow that I know of.
My youth was stolen.
What had been [00:45:00] taken from me was the agency to determine the trajectory of my own young life.
And I couldn't get them to the table of restorative justice. restorative justice requires an encounter that is Meaningful, and I couldn't get people to the table. And so I was mad.
I would rant and Rave in my head or to friends about how unfair and now and just all of this was why should I not Do some kind of an expose of what had happened. It was going to go public with what they did, I was going to go as sue them, I was going to….you know, just a lot of loose talk.
I would rather be free. I would rather not drag those chains behind me anymore.
[00:46:00] Forgiveness is about me. It's not about her. forgiveness is about my Choices.
And I have forgiven. And forgiven and forgiven that same person many times.
Casting her out or anyone out of community is like taking away their opportunity to get better, and it's important to me that we all have the opportunity to get better. There has to be a road back from even that kind of terrible Behavior. There has to be light for them to come back toward or why come back. Why change? [00:47:00]
At the end of what I told her. I told her that forgiveness is freedom for me and that I forgave her.
She did not look up.
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GIL
It was a Saturday in June of 2002. I was near a little Lake in st. Paul for some reason and I got in my car and I turned on the radio and I think they made some reference about the Bishops meeting in Dallas. And that they had proclaimed a zero-tolerance policy. And I thought I'm done.
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STEPHANIE
What happened at the Bishops meeting in Dallas was that they'd passed the Dallas charter, which is basically a set of rules for dealing with priests who have [00:48:00] committed sexual abuse.
It includes a policy of zero tolerance, which means that any priest has been credibly accused must be removed from Ministry. By the time the Dallas charter came along Gil had been in recovery for 20 years.
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GIL
I believe I called the sister who was in charge of the community and made some reference to the Bishops meeting in Dallas.
And I and I said, I think this may well be the last Sunday would be the last time I would say, Mass. and. I said what I would like to do is I want to preach the gospel. I want to be able to preach one more time and I preached. And then after communion, I got up to the inside, you know, my presumption is that this will be my last Sunday with you because of the Dallas charter.
[00:49:00] And I just said, you know, it's by that point of course, I was all choked up. And I just said, you know, it's been such a gift for me to be able to be here with you.
I never said a public Mass again.
When I look back over my years in a 25 years I functioned as a priest for 25 years. It was the center part of my life.
I had had Parish Ministry gone because of is a rightful consequence of my bad behavior, and I was given this second chance. To be able to be a pastor of sorts to this community of sisters who believed so deeply and they said to [00:50:00] me, a very publicly broken sinful man: We want you to lead us in prayer.
In the beginning I pushed back against it and said this isn't right. This isn't fair. I've done all you've asked me to do. the structure of My Life as a priest in the church helps to guarantee safety. and it felt like it was a one-size-fit-all solution by the Bishops. Doesn't my hard work and therapy and and living living out a safe life doesn't that count for anything?
It was the hardest consequence I've ever faced. That was far more painful to me than jail time or having my name in The Press or anything else. It's the deepest grief of my [00:51:00] life.
So in the beginning, I was very angry about that.
Over time I've come to be able to say that this is another consequence of my behavior.
If I hadn't sexually abused boys, None of this would have happened. This is a consequence of my behavior.
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SUSAN + GIL
We met over at the Egg and I didn't we? No, Keeves. Of course. Yes. Well [00:52:00] similar similar similar, but diners diners :)
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STEPHANIE
Susan and Gil met not at the Egg and I, but at Keeves to talk through a presentation they were invited to give at the Minnesota Department of Corrections. But Susan and Gil had initially met a couple years earlier at a local conference on the treatment of sex offenders. Susan spoke on a panel and Gil introduced himself to her afterwards.
They realized they were both interested in restorative justice. And so they jumped at the opportunity when a couple years later, they were invited by the Minnesota Department of Corrections to present to their staff. and their presentation went so well that they met up to talk about doing it again.
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SUSAN + GIL
My recollection was you inviting me to come to a breakfast meeting at the Egg and I oh gosh, that's where the Egg and I comes in. That's correct. And I don't know that we had the name on common conversation yet. But this idea [00:53:00] of what kind of a process could we design that would allow people to finally talk about sex abuse in the Catholic Church?
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STEPHANIE
What kind of a process would allow people to finally talk about sex abuse in the Catholic church? that question let Susan and Gilda host their first Uncommon Conversation in November of 2012. the intention of Uncommon Conversation was to Apply restorative justice not to one-on-one healing between abuser and victim, but to group healing within the Catholic Community.
Susan and Gil gathered a local group of Survivor Advocates and social workers and Faith leaders and other community members to talk through three questions:
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SUSAN + GIL
The first question was how has the abuse issue affected you? Second question was what is the way forward for you? And what is the way forward for the church?
[00:54:00] The third question. What about our conversation today gives you hope?
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STEPHANIE
The Uncommon Conversation ended by asking participants for feedback and the feedback was extraordinary. people were emotionally exhausted but they were also enormously relieved to finally talk through the sex abuse crisis in a way that was open and personal and oriented towards finding a way forward.
So Susan and Gil did a second Uncommon Conversation. and then they went for a third, this time reaching out to the people at the top of their archdiocese, but the church leadership was not so receptive.
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SUSAN + GIL
The main criticism was that we had a Survivor and a perpetrator working together. That was the main criticism.
How [00:55:00] do you do restorative justice when you don't have all the points of the the circle in the room?
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STEPHANIE
The Archdiocese of st. Paul and Minneapolis was actually mandated to use restorative justice as a result of lawsuits brought against it for failing to protect vulnerable people from sexual abuse.
But even with that mandate, Church leadership wouldn't touch Uncommon Conversation because Gil was involved. With lawsuits against the Archdiocese and the Archdiocese is going into bankruptcy to pay settlements and the Archbishop being asked to resign by the Vatican for himself Allegedly committing abuse, the climate in the Twin Cities became inhospitable to Susan and Gil’s collaboration.
So Susan and Gil put their uncommon conversation [00:56:00] in quiet mode.
Why do priests commit sexual abuse? There are so many answers to that question. But a simple one is: because they have the power.
Gil talks about the experience of being given that power - of being 26 years old and called “father” by someone twice his age. And Gil also says that when he had the power taken away and became a priest for a community of nuns who put him on no pedestal and knew precisely have broken He was, he became a better preacher. [00:57:00] That seems both obvious and beautiful: that by letting go of some of the power that contributes to clergy sex abuse, a priest can become better at his actual job. Paraphrasing an imaginary Pope Francis from reckonings episode 22, ‘clergy abuse their power in ways that deny the words They recite. this crisis of clergy sex abuse is their opportunity to share that power, and be better vessels for the divine.
In the fall of 2015 Spotlight came out. the film tells the story of how the Boston Globe exposed widespread clergy sex abuse in the Boston area [00:58:00] and the following year Spotlight won the Oscar for Best Picture. Susan and Gil took the momentum from that and brought Uncommon Conversation back online with a screening of Spotlight.
Then they did a second screening, and then a third in December of 2018. At that point the lawsuits against their archdiocese had finally been settled and the Archdiocese was finally coming out of bankruptcy and the local climate for restorative justice was becoming a little more hospitable again.
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SUSAN + GIL + STEPHANIE
We're starting to get calls from people from a number of places just in the last couple of weeks. You you're one of them. Actually. I'm a part of this. Yeah, we are today…
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STEPHANIE
Susan and Gil are finally organizing that third Uncommon Conversation and this time it's going to be at an actual Parish [00:59:00] which would be like hosting a dialogue about mass incarceration at a prison.
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SUSAN
There's a wonderful life after you do your work about this and for that not to be part of the story is a crime. If you get help and if you do your work, it becomes a part of your story. Not your entire story.
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SUSAN + GIL
We get together every couple of weeks. Yeah, I would say I don't think it goes much Beyond a couple of weeks. Yes. I mean we have breakfast at the same local restaurant great and we live happily in the same neighborhood. So we're probably a couple of miles apart blue miles apart and and I will share things with you that I see on the internet you share things with me. Now, we email a lot of a lot of email going on. Yeah.
Because you can't cut the people of God in two!
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STEPHANIE
[01:00:00] Susan Pavlak lives in st. Paul Minnesota where she's retired. She spends her time with her family and her parish and on working to bring restorative justice to clergy sexual abuse. She still has to forgive and re forgive her abuser, but she's many decades sober and says her life is beautiful.
Gil Gustafson lives just a couple miles away from Susan. he was forced into early retirement by renewed publicity of his story in 2013. So he spends most of his time collaborating with Susan and volunteering on issues He cares about. Including restoring the right to vote and removing barriers to employment for people with felonies. Gil is confident He would never [01:01:00] abuse again, but he still has the attraction. So he's careful about how he navigates proximity to children and is almost always in the company of people who know his story.
An extra big thank you to Susan and Gil who haven't told their story in this depth in a really long time. telling the most intimate and painful experiences of their lives is hard work.
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SUSAN + GIL
Oh my God. God love us. This is some of the hardest work I ever do. it's never easy.
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STEPHANIE
Big thank yous also go:
to the Gilead project the 501 c 3 which houses Susan and Gil’s Uncommon Conversation and is dedicated to healing and preventing sexual abuse
to the National Association of community and restorative justice which promotes forms of [01:02:00] justice that are Equitable sustainable and socially constructive
to the brilliant folks who shared their insights Helena de Groot, Janine Genske, Peter Isely, and Phil Saviano
and to a few of our friends on patreon - you too can join this list of esteemed supporters at patreon.com/reckonings:
Abigail Farrell
Greg Berguig
Trevor Stutz
Tibet Sprague
Kenny Alston
Kyle Studstill
Rose Hulls
P Foster
Lafrey Whitbrod
Jordan A Patterson
and Christopher.
I'm Stephanie Lepp and if you made it all the way here, let me give one more Thank you to you for listening to Reckonings :)
Note: Transcripts may contain errors, and audio should be checked before quoting in print.
[00:00:00]
STEPHANIE
For those of you who heard reckonings episode 21 featuring Anwen and Sameer and episode 22 featuring an imaginary Pope Francis, I was not planning to come right back to the topic of sexual abuse, but Susan and Gil were willing to share their story with us and it is just too potent and to timely not to tell.
This time I'm going to put the content warning up front. What you're about to hear contains non-consensual sexual activity. It's not graphic and it's not violent, but it is non-consensual. And with that, this is Reckonings. An exploration of how we change our hearts and Minds. I'm Stephanie Lepp and this is Susan:
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SUSAN
it's a little bit like a fish talking about water [00:01:00] because it's so mundane isn't the right word, but ever present our faith.
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STEPHANIE
And this is Gil:
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GIL
about the time, I was maybe nine years old. I started articulating that I thought I wanted to be a priest. My image of priesthood was kind of a community organizer in church is where the parishioners are nourished and fed in order for them to go out into the world and do the work of the church and the world bringing the message of love and compassion out into the world.
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STEPHANIE
Gil and Susan grew up in the Twin Cities. they both went to Catholic schools. At the beginning of Susan's junior year of high school. She gave a presentation that to all incoming faculty.
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SUSAN
I was wearing a black shirt [00:02:00] with a very long collar because it was the 70s and jumper that I borrowed from my oldest sister and you know, I felt pretty cool.
When I exited the Little Theater there was, you know kind of cookies and Juice sort of around and people were mingling and a new teacher was there and came up to me and began talking to me about my presentation.
She was cheerful. And forthcoming and bright and one thing I remember is I had to keep backing up because…I felt she was much closer than minnesotans usually stood so I kept backing up and eventually I was back against the wall.
She kept finding me [00:03:00] in school and asking me to come and have lunch with her in a room and I had a book of poetry - a book of Yevtushenko’s poetry.
Actually. I remember the poem. I was reading Babi Yar and I had it with my books in the student council room and she said oh you're reading poetry and I said yes and. I think she asked me if I knew who EE Cummings was and I did and I think she shared a poem with me like out of memory and I was very impressed because you know memorizing poem is impressive and I remember the poem.
I think of Olaf glad and big. yeah, it was an anti-war poem.
Well I was impressed God I was you know, there was this sort of heroic [00:04:00] person. I had a lot of respect for teachers and I thought a lot of the and. I knew she was a former nun. And I often not thought I might want to be one.
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STEPHANIE
Meanwhile Gill did become a priest.
He was ordained at age 26 and assigned to a parish just outside st. Paul. Gil arrived in mid-june, but on the fourth of July the head priest had a heart attack and for whatever reason the Archdiocese didn't send in a temporary administrator. They decided that 26 year-old Gil, one month ordained, could cover the work of two priests and single-handedly run a parish of a thousand families.
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GIL
I discovered I'd love to preach and the feedback I got was that I was good at it, you know when the hardest of moments at death [00:05:00] a suicide a family war or joyous moments, like weddings baptisms birth of children. It's like I had. I was given full entree to share people's lives in the most important moments and I was in love with it.
But it was exhausting. I just remember kind of always doing something. It was like okay here. I am another couple to get ready for marriage all here. We are another couple at struggling with their marriage all here. We are I'm doing baptism preparation. So it was like a lot of things to do constant stream of things to do.
I just felt like man, what do I get? I give and I give and I give and what do I get? What I started to get was sexual fantasy [00:06:00] and the sexual fantasy. Focused on boys in the parish. I think when I was about 21 and a senior in college was when I realized that I had this sexual attraction to boys and I was getting older and these boys were staying about the same age 12 13 14 years old.
I would feel like you know, it's okay. I'm doing all this hard work. So it's okay. If I do this fantasy if I masturbate to this fantasy.
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SUSAN
She asked me if I would go out to supper with her
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STEPHANIE
Susan had been spending more and more time with that new teacher.
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SUSAN
I said I could you know, [00:07:00] I. Ask my parents if I could and they thought that would be okay. I remember the restaurant we went to and.
she gave me this book of poetry. by EE Cummings. and then when we were going to go out. I remember walking out and going to the parking lot and. Getting in the car and her saying to me. Are we friends? Well, I said yeah, and she said Can friends do anything with friends and I said, well, I guess I think so and. she laid down on top of me and kissed me.
I had not done any kissing.
[00:08:00] Up to then.
and she quit when some restaurant worker came out to empty the trash in the dumpster in front of the car. We were parked at and looked in. and subsequent to that. Drove me to her home. I said my folks won't I can't stay overnight? My folks won't let me stay overnight and she said I'll tell him it's okay.
And I said, I don't I don't think I should stay overnight but it was far away from where I was another suburb. So it was not where I lived. And so I went downstairs.
[00:09:00] and she continued from where she left off in the car.
I remember laying there and I remember being scared. I remember thinking what the hell this other person thinks. It's okay to touch me. All over my body. And I don't understand what's going on it and I don't understand why we're not sleeping. I don't understand why she's kissing me grabbing me putting her hands in my pants.
My understanding of what she was doing was Sexual intercourse which is, you know [00:10:00] something I'd read about.
I was terrified that I was in a situation that somehow I must be responsible for but I had no control over. That somehow all along the way I must have done something wrong.
I didn't hit her. I didn't fight back. I didn't do any of that. My brain was on fire.
And I got up. In from the bed and walked out into the hall and went into the bathroom. And I found a razor and then I thought. Catholics can kill themselves and I went back into the bedroom.
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GIL
I was [00:11:00] on a field trip with a group of the Altar Boys at the parish and we went to a local amusement park and there was oh, I don't know 20 25 boys and probably two or three adults in myself as the chaperones and there was this one boy.
And he was one of the altar servers these were all altar servers and he was kind of a Clinger a needy kid in a way and so he was hanging out with me the whole day and on one of the rides we were in a. Car together or whatever and I slipped my hand between his legs. And you know, he didn't object to it.
And [00:12:00] so as the day when I run these various rides and more often than not there to person rides. So I kept doing it and and feeling his his penis. And. in the fact that he didn't seem to respond negatively said to me that he must be okay with it.
I knew it was wrong to do that. That I was taking advantage. This kid had served Mass was pretty clear. You know, he liked me looked up to me.
There's a certain sense of danger too well. What if he reacts negatively. What if he tells one of the adults? Oh my God, then what? You know I shouldn't be doing this I shouldn't be doing this.
[00:13:00] And afterwards, you know when I got home that night it was like oh my god. What have I done? This is awful.
He was probably like 13, maybe 14. I would have been about 20 29 maybe 30.
The urge was constant. The urge to have sexual interaction with these young teenage boys either I would push against it or not. But the urge was constant the acting on the Urge was more sporadic. [00:14:00] Some of it was dependent on availability. You know what I'd be with with a boy where I could you know, give him a hug and maybe get us a sneak, you know squeeze in her touches but or whatever.
The certainly wasn't a month that went by that. I didn't have to maybe three instances of some kind of inappropriate Touch of boys.
What I knew was that this wasn't right. I didn't delude myself into thinking I'm teaching this boy about sex or. Not even necessarily that you know that this is something he likes.
Was I curious about it, did I want [00:15:00] to learn about it? Well, no, I was mostly ashamed it's like you know, why why am I having this sexual attraction?
Yeah, so wasn't it wasn't a lot of Consciousness around this there's a ton of suppression going on. I didn't want it and I was trying to get rid of it and I was trying to push it down which just kept feeding it. I felt awful that I was doing this and yet it just felt like I can't stop
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SUSAN
I took on that it was my fault.
I can't go to school. I feel sick all the time. I'm in school. I feel sick. I'm with my family. I feel sick. I'm with her. I feel sick. [00:16:00] I feel crazy and I and I feel trapped.
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STEPHANIE
One night over the summer Gil went to the house of the boy. He'd abused at the amusement park who had become his primary victim
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GIL
and I drove over to his house and his parents were there and so I chatted with his parents and he was sleeping. out on a portrait least he that's. You can kind of claim that space is a place for him to sleep and he was already out there.
So I chatted with his folks for a while and he had come into the house at some point knew I was there and he said to me I want, you know, come on see me before you go. And I'm thinking okay. So now it's [00:17:00] literally it's probably about 9:30 10:00 at night. And so I go onto the porch and he had a little cot on the porch and he touched me in my groin and
and I. He asked me he asked me if I would lie down with him on this cot. And I said no I can't do that. I was terribly afraid of you know, what would happen if his parents came out in the two of us are lying on his cot. And so I was at that point. I just need to get out of here and he you know.
Kind of reached for my my pants [00:18:00] my groin. but I offered to give him a blowjob and. but he said he wanted to give me a blowjob and. And I'm like, oh my God, this is craziness. So but he did start that and I was sitting on a chair next to this cut and I was holding his head. and
so I. You know, I thought man I got to get out of here. And I did stop him. It was like mostly out of fear. I mean, it's like my God at Any moment is [00:19:00] parents could come out to see why what's taking you so long so I stopped it. And said, I've got to go. You know zipped up my pants and snuck out to my car.
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STEPHANIE
Let's just be really clear that not fighting a sexual advance from another person, and even enjoying it, and even soliciting it does not necessarily imply consent. Under circumstances in which one party is underage And there is a major asymmetry of power - which was the case for both Gil and Susan - there may be no such thing as meaningful consent.
Susan ran away to Omaha. She [00:20:00] took a bus and spent the rest of her money on a motel. And woke up the next morning to realize it was too cold to hitchhike any farther. She was scared to be so far away from home by herself. And so she called a friend who then called the teacher. Her friend had no reason not to - everyone knew they were closed (including Susan's parents who the teacher had told she'd kept Susan overnight for extended counseling).
And the teacher volunteered herself to pick Susan up in Omaha, Nebraska and bring her home to st. Paul, Minnesota. Of course, it was jarring to be getting in her teacher's car, but Susan was relieved to be going home.
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SUSAN
I fell asleep in the car. I thought we'd get home about after supper is [00:21:00] all I had encoded.
By that time my folks knew I was coming. I woke up and we were pulling into her driveway not my folks driveway.
and. she said I just can't drive anymore. Took me into the same house the same bedroom.
And I know that there was sexual activity of that night. I know that it happened and I don't remember it at the same time. I laid in the bed. I didn't sleep. I was afraid. I knew I couldn't stop this. I knew that in her bathroom was a razor. And I went in to that bathroom. And I took the razor and I cut my [00:22:00] left wrist with it.
I wanted out. I didn't want to kill myself, but I didn't know how to get out.
I was bleeding. And she must have awakened. Came to the to the bathroom door and knocked. and. I opened the door and when she looked in and she saw the razor and she saw my wrist and she said give me your wrist and bound it up.
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STEPHANIE
Susan didn't sleep that night. And in the morning, her abuser finally took her home.
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SUSAN
the bandage was full of blood. [00:23:00] I had not shown my folks, but my mother saw it…My mother's a nurse. my mother put her arm around me and said Susie. We're going to take you to the hospital because we've got to do something to keep you.
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STEPHANIE
Not long after the incident on the porch, Gil got an invitation to meet with the vicar General. Basically the second in command to the bishop.
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GIL
So I walked in to his office and sat down and the vicar General hands to me a letter and said I'd like you to read this. [00:24:00] And it was addressed to me. And it was written by my primary victim.
And in it he was he described some of the sexual behavior we had engaged in. But I read it.
And I hand the letter back to the vicar General and he pauses. And then he says well, what do you have to say?
I could deny this. I'm I'm a very believable credible person in this 15 16 year old boy could be disbelieved and I could I could say oh no. I have no idea what he's talking about. Am I going to deny this letter? [00:25:00] Or am I going to acknowledge that what this boy is saying is true.
I don't want to keep running away from this it's time to turn and face what I have done no matter what the consequences are.
And so I when I handed the letter back in the asked, what did I have to say? I said to him it's true.
And then he says well you're going to need to probably talk to the Archbishop about this and they'll be some steps will have to take and and I said, okay. So I walked out of the Chancery and got into my car, which was a tiny little Dodge Colt a little tin can of a car. And I got on Interstate 94 heading east out of st.
[00:26:00] Paul. And was driving at 70 miles an hour. And I thought to myself I could just turn this car into a bridge abutment and would seem like an accident and I'd be dead.
Because I thought everything that mattered to me. The priesthood that I love so much. Was going to be gone. I couldn't imagine that anyone my family or friends anyone could hear of this behavior and think of me as anything but a piece of shit. Think of me as anything but despicable. And so I thought well what if I just put an end to it?
I kept driving and driving and driving and 15 20 miles later is at the Wisconsin border [00:27:00] and by now that the impetus to kill myself had quieted and I turned around and drove back to the place where I was living and try to figure out what's next.
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SUSAN
I was not telling the psychiatrist what had gone on. I did not tell my folks what had gone on well, and I couldn't betray her. She had told me that terrible things would happen to her. She would go to prison and I didn't want to be responsible for for her going to prison.
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STEPHANIE
Susan spent most of the fall and the beginning of winter in the psych ward at the hospital where she was given a diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia. shortly before Christmas 1970, She was released from the hospital to the custody of her parents and went [00:28:00] home.
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SUSAN
and when I got back to school after Christmas the teacher was gone. My abuser was no longer teaching there.
I enjoyed school. I loved being sort of involved in student government. I was very interested in leadership kinds of activities and. And I quit them all when I got back to school. Everybody walked on eggshells because they didn't know what I would do next because of course. They didn't know what had happened in the first place.
I lost the easy intimacy that I had with my siblings and my parents but they it all got shattered. [00:29:00] Everybody watched me like when is she going to take a razor to herself next?
I had no joy, I had no energy. I had difficulty sleeping. I had intrusive thoughts. I was was having a hard time getting up and going to class. And and I just couldn't I couldn't I couldn't make I couldn't put it together and I couldn't I couldn't make it work.
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GIL
Who I knew myself to be prior to August of 1982 was this talented up-and-coming bright boy priests who could do anything and proved it by running a parish two weeks ordained.
All that was gone. And now it's who the hell am I?
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STEPHANIE
Who Gil was was a highly publicized [00:30:00] convicted felon. During his five-year tenure at the parish, he’d abused for boys ranging from 10 to 15 years old. He was sentenced to one and a half years in state prison plus 10 years of supervised probation.
He also went into therapy. He started reading accounts of victims of sexual abuse to learn about the kind of impact he had on his own victims and friends who themselves were victims started reaching out to him asking for help understanding why someone would do something like this.
Susan had started drinking, heavily. She'd had another stay in a psych ward and was now on her second attempt at College.
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SUSAN
I was living in an apartment above a store in Morris Minnesota while I was attending college there. [00:31:00] I believe it was late fall kind of mid-afternoon when I got a phone call. and.
When I picked up the phone and answered it there was silence for a moment. And then I heard this hello. I'm going to be coming to Morris tomorrow. and I took me a minute to recognize the voice, but my body probably recognized it before I did because I remember sliding down the wall and sitting down on the floor.
And. I said. coming here for what? and she went on to tell me something about she was in the area for work and wanted to see me.
[00:32:00] Finally I said no, I just said no. and she proceeded to. Tell me that we could go out to dinner. She take me to dinner. And I just said no, don't call me again and then I hung up.
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STEPHANIE
Susan's teacher had abused her through the end of high school and for another four years afterwards, but after that phone call the abuse stopped.
Susan finally went into rehab and it was her counselor who introduced her to an idea. She had never considered
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SUSAN
she said. You were abused. Really my jaw kind of hit my knees, and I just looked at her. It was [00:33:00] for a moment that somebody thought it was somebody else's fault and I've been thinking it was my fault.
It was really Thunderish, kinda. In a good way. And it freed me to start dealing with what had happened to me and calling it by name. Oh, no, that's not how this story goes. This is how the story goes. You are not the author of this story anymore. I am.
I was angry. I walked a fine line for a while.
I started reading the Bible for one. I was reading about grief and sorrow and redemption and hope.
[00:34:00] there has to be Redemption after horror. There has to be a way to repair. restorative justice is everywhere in the Christian and the Hebrew tradition as well
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STEPHANIE
Although not by that name restorative justice is everywhere in the Christian and Jewish traditions because it embodies Christian and Jewish values.
Of mercy and forgiveness and Redemption. by that name restorative justice is a response to Crime that engages offenders and victims in repairing the harm that was caused. Susan knew she wanted to learn more and so she dove into the literature and got a local Professor to Mentor her. And started going to trainings on restorative justice.
[00:35:00] When Gil got out of jail, he couldn't go back to being a priest in a setting where there were kids around. So he started doing administrative work for the Archdiocese, but he was offered a position as a priest in a monastery of nuns where he had no contact with children and everyone knew his story.
He actually told his story to the entire community of nuns.
-
GIL
So I laid out the abusive behavior and all this and sisters. Listen very quietly and very, Patiently and kindly and then all of a sudden they were breaking kind of they were going back to the inside the monastery Into The Cloister and one of the sisters stopped and tugged on my arm and said Gil, thank you for for sharing all that and being so honest and so straightforward said, you know, you [00:36:00] probably look at us and think here's this bunch of holy ladies.
Well, we all have stories too.
One day the rectory phone rings, you know, so I pick it up and I say, you know, hello St. Peters and on the other end is my primary victim. And what he said was I want to I want to I want to talk with you.
And you said I want I want I want to get together with you and want you to see me.
He said I forgive you.
I'm sorry. This is my fault. You didn't do anything wrong. That's the message I would have liked to have been able to give. [00:37:00]
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STEPHANIE
The terms of Gil’s probation meant that there was no way he could meet with his primary victim.
Soon after that phone call Gil was invited to speak at a conference on sex abuse in religious settings. right before it was his turn to speak a young man told his own story about being abused by an Episcopalian priest.
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GIL
So he finished and then it was my turn to speak. And I walked up there and walked to the podium and I thought oh God, these folks have just heard this incredibly painful story, you know, here's the guy the causes that kind of pain gonna talk.
And I remember the young man took his place kind of right in front of the podium. So I'm staring right at him as I'm giving my. My account my talk, and I remember speaking directly to him. [00:38:00] and saying. You know that I am sorry. He had been abused as one who had abused boys myself. I was sorry that he had been abused.
And that I wanted him to know that it had never been his fault. There are moments when you're speaking, giving a talk or preaching, when the room gets very quiet. And you can almost hear or feel people listening. And that's what was happening. When I apologized to this young man for the pain that had been caused to him almost in the room was really dialed in.
When I was sexually acting out, when I was abusing boys, I would have these moments of being afraid of what happens if somebody finds out I'm doing this. [00:39:00] I was afraid of consequences like being thrown out of priesthood. perhaps having to deal with the police in the court system. And then I'd kind of creep up on my fear.
But oh my God, what if I go to jail? What if this gets in the press and then everybody knows? You know that I haven't been thrown out of priesthood. But the other consequences all came true. And they were painful. But each and every one had a gift. Having the court of law judge. My behavior was liberating.
Well, it was painful to be in jail it to became a gift. a penalty was imposed and I fulfilled that penalty. And while, I'm sure [00:40:00] there are some for whom I represent despicable behavior and they would wish I didn't exist, I discovered that there were quite a number of people in my life who could hear of this and Support me and still love me still stay in relationship with me. I did this. it's nobody's fault, but mine. I misused my position of power to get my needs met. and I must accept responsibility. And once we do that once we accept our own personal responsibility. You can say okay, now I've got to change.
Holding people responsible and getting them to understand what it is that got them there where the way they are, That's the place [00:41:00] of change. Don't spare your offenders their consequences. don't spare the consequences. You're doing your offenders no favors. The consequences can be the path to heal and become whole.
So I finished and I could tell people were really hearing me and there was Applause and it was time for lunch. So I got off the podium and the young man was still standing there and. Some people were chatting with him and some people were chatting with me and he turned to me and he said thank you for what you said.
Would it be okay if we hugged? And I said, oh, yes. And we did.
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STEPHANIE
[00:42:00] Meanwhile, Susan was looking for her own restorative encounter. She reached out to the religious order that her abuser had been part of as a nun. But eventually they just got their Law Firm to make her go away. And so she contacted the Archdiocese which had employed her abuser as a teacher at a Catholic High School and still had some degree of jurisdiction over her. This time she got a meeting with the vicar General Kevin McDonough.
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SUSAN
and he said do you want to meet with this person? And I said, yes I do.
I remember the whole week before the meeting. I worried I fretted I didn't sleep I had nightmares. I wondered if I was going to quit on myself. I chose my clothing. [00:43:00] I wore my best power suit from my professional life. and. Made a copy with big enough print and some space between so I could read the what I had to say because I knew it was going to be very difficult to do and so I knew I'd have to read it.
She walked into the room with a winter coat on. Kevin sat her down across the other side of the table and he sat at the head of the table and he kind of made some introductory remarks. And he said then Susan is going to talk about whatever she has to say to you and then I went ahead and I spoke.
I was shaky. [00:44:00] I didn't break down. I didn't cry. It wasn't really being taken in. It was sort of being survived. like she was just sort of showing up but not really there.
and eventually she said.
I'm sorry that this happened to you.
Which I thought was an odd way to put it because she wasn't taking any responsibility.
She had no sorrow that I know of.
My youth was stolen.
What had been [00:45:00] taken from me was the agency to determine the trajectory of my own young life.
And I couldn't get them to the table of restorative justice. restorative justice requires an encounter that is Meaningful, and I couldn't get people to the table. And so I was mad.
I would rant and Rave in my head or to friends about how unfair and now and just all of this was why should I not Do some kind of an expose of what had happened. It was going to go public with what they did, I was going to go as sue them, I was going to….you know, just a lot of loose talk.
I would rather be free. I would rather not drag those chains behind me anymore.
[00:46:00] Forgiveness is about me. It's not about her. forgiveness is about my Choices.
And I have forgiven. And forgiven and forgiven that same person many times.
Casting her out or anyone out of community is like taking away their opportunity to get better, and it's important to me that we all have the opportunity to get better. There has to be a road back from even that kind of terrible Behavior. There has to be light for them to come back toward or why come back. Why change? [00:47:00]
At the end of what I told her. I told her that forgiveness is freedom for me and that I forgave her.
She did not look up.
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GIL
It was a Saturday in June of 2002. I was near a little Lake in st. Paul for some reason and I got in my car and I turned on the radio and I think they made some reference about the Bishops meeting in Dallas. And that they had proclaimed a zero-tolerance policy. And I thought I'm done.
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STEPHANIE
What happened at the Bishops meeting in Dallas was that they'd passed the Dallas charter, which is basically a set of rules for dealing with priests who have [00:48:00] committed sexual abuse.
It includes a policy of zero tolerance, which means that any priest has been credibly accused must be removed from Ministry. By the time the Dallas charter came along Gil had been in recovery for 20 years.
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GIL
I believe I called the sister who was in charge of the community and made some reference to the Bishops meeting in Dallas.
And I and I said, I think this may well be the last Sunday would be the last time I would say, Mass. and. I said what I would like to do is I want to preach the gospel. I want to be able to preach one more time and I preached. And then after communion, I got up to the inside, you know, my presumption is that this will be my last Sunday with you because of the Dallas charter.
[00:49:00] And I just said, you know, it's by that point of course, I was all choked up. And I just said, you know, it's been such a gift for me to be able to be here with you.
I never said a public Mass again.
When I look back over my years in a 25 years I functioned as a priest for 25 years. It was the center part of my life.
I had had Parish Ministry gone because of is a rightful consequence of my bad behavior, and I was given this second chance. To be able to be a pastor of sorts to this community of sisters who believed so deeply and they said to [00:50:00] me, a very publicly broken sinful man: We want you to lead us in prayer.
In the beginning I pushed back against it and said this isn't right. This isn't fair. I've done all you've asked me to do. the structure of My Life as a priest in the church helps to guarantee safety. and it felt like it was a one-size-fit-all solution by the Bishops. Doesn't my hard work and therapy and and living living out a safe life doesn't that count for anything?
It was the hardest consequence I've ever faced. That was far more painful to me than jail time or having my name in The Press or anything else. It's the deepest grief of my [00:51:00] life.
So in the beginning, I was very angry about that.
Over time I've come to be able to say that this is another consequence of my behavior.
If I hadn't sexually abused boys, None of this would have happened. This is a consequence of my behavior.
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SUSAN + GIL
We met over at the Egg and I didn't we? No, Keeves. Of course. Yes. Well [00:52:00] similar similar similar, but diners diners :)
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STEPHANIE
Susan and Gil met not at the Egg and I, but at Keeves to talk through a presentation they were invited to give at the Minnesota Department of Corrections. But Susan and Gil had initially met a couple years earlier at a local conference on the treatment of sex offenders. Susan spoke on a panel and Gil introduced himself to her afterwards.
They realized they were both interested in restorative justice. And so they jumped at the opportunity when a couple years later, they were invited by the Minnesota Department of Corrections to present to their staff. and their presentation went so well that they met up to talk about doing it again.
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SUSAN + GIL
My recollection was you inviting me to come to a breakfast meeting at the Egg and I oh gosh, that's where the Egg and I comes in. That's correct. And I don't know that we had the name on common conversation yet. But this idea [00:53:00] of what kind of a process could we design that would allow people to finally talk about sex abuse in the Catholic Church?
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STEPHANIE
What kind of a process would allow people to finally talk about sex abuse in the Catholic church? that question let Susan and Gilda host their first Uncommon Conversation in November of 2012. the intention of Uncommon Conversation was to Apply restorative justice not to one-on-one healing between abuser and victim, but to group healing within the Catholic Community.
Susan and Gil gathered a local group of Survivor Advocates and social workers and Faith leaders and other community members to talk through three questions:
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SUSAN + GIL
The first question was how has the abuse issue affected you? Second question was what is the way forward for you? And what is the way forward for the church?
[00:54:00] The third question. What about our conversation today gives you hope?
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STEPHANIE
The Uncommon Conversation ended by asking participants for feedback and the feedback was extraordinary. people were emotionally exhausted but they were also enormously relieved to finally talk through the sex abuse crisis in a way that was open and personal and oriented towards finding a way forward.
So Susan and Gil did a second Uncommon Conversation. and then they went for a third, this time reaching out to the people at the top of their archdiocese, but the church leadership was not so receptive.
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SUSAN + GIL
The main criticism was that we had a Survivor and a perpetrator working together. That was the main criticism.
How [00:55:00] do you do restorative justice when you don't have all the points of the the circle in the room?
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STEPHANIE
The Archdiocese of st. Paul and Minneapolis was actually mandated to use restorative justice as a result of lawsuits brought against it for failing to protect vulnerable people from sexual abuse.
But even with that mandate, Church leadership wouldn't touch Uncommon Conversation because Gil was involved. With lawsuits against the Archdiocese and the Archdiocese is going into bankruptcy to pay settlements and the Archbishop being asked to resign by the Vatican for himself Allegedly committing abuse, the climate in the Twin Cities became inhospitable to Susan and Gil’s collaboration.
So Susan and Gil put their uncommon conversation [00:56:00] in quiet mode.
Why do priests commit sexual abuse? There are so many answers to that question. But a simple one is: because they have the power.
Gil talks about the experience of being given that power - of being 26 years old and called “father” by someone twice his age. And Gil also says that when he had the power taken away and became a priest for a community of nuns who put him on no pedestal and knew precisely have broken He was, he became a better preacher. [00:57:00] That seems both obvious and beautiful: that by letting go of some of the power that contributes to clergy sex abuse, a priest can become better at his actual job. Paraphrasing an imaginary Pope Francis from reckonings episode 22, ‘clergy abuse their power in ways that deny the words They recite. this crisis of clergy sex abuse is their opportunity to share that power, and be better vessels for the divine.
In the fall of 2015 Spotlight came out. the film tells the story of how the Boston Globe exposed widespread clergy sex abuse in the Boston area [00:58:00] and the following year Spotlight won the Oscar for Best Picture. Susan and Gil took the momentum from that and brought Uncommon Conversation back online with a screening of Spotlight.
Then they did a second screening, and then a third in December of 2018. At that point the lawsuits against their archdiocese had finally been settled and the Archdiocese was finally coming out of bankruptcy and the local climate for restorative justice was becoming a little more hospitable again.
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SUSAN + GIL + STEPHANIE
We're starting to get calls from people from a number of places just in the last couple of weeks. You you're one of them. Actually. I'm a part of this. Yeah, we are today…
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STEPHANIE
Susan and Gil are finally organizing that third Uncommon Conversation and this time it's going to be at an actual Parish [00:59:00] which would be like hosting a dialogue about mass incarceration at a prison.
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SUSAN
There's a wonderful life after you do your work about this and for that not to be part of the story is a crime. If you get help and if you do your work, it becomes a part of your story. Not your entire story.
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SUSAN + GIL
We get together every couple of weeks. Yeah, I would say I don't think it goes much Beyond a couple of weeks. Yes. I mean we have breakfast at the same local restaurant great and we live happily in the same neighborhood. So we're probably a couple of miles apart blue miles apart and and I will share things with you that I see on the internet you share things with me. Now, we email a lot of a lot of email going on. Yeah.
Because you can't cut the people of God in two!
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STEPHANIE
[01:00:00] Susan Pavlak lives in st. Paul Minnesota where she's retired. She spends her time with her family and her parish and on working to bring restorative justice to clergy sexual abuse. She still has to forgive and re forgive her abuser, but she's many decades sober and says her life is beautiful.
Gil Gustafson lives just a couple miles away from Susan. he was forced into early retirement by renewed publicity of his story in 2013. So he spends most of his time collaborating with Susan and volunteering on issues He cares about. Including restoring the right to vote and removing barriers to employment for people with felonies. Gil is confident He would never [01:01:00] abuse again, but he still has the attraction. So he's careful about how he navigates proximity to children and is almost always in the company of people who know his story.
An extra big thank you to Susan and Gil who haven't told their story in this depth in a really long time. telling the most intimate and painful experiences of their lives is hard work.
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SUSAN + GIL
Oh my God. God love us. This is some of the hardest work I ever do. it's never easy.
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STEPHANIE
Big thank yous also go:
to the Gilead project the 501 c 3 which houses Susan and Gil’s Uncommon Conversation and is dedicated to healing and preventing sexual abuse
to the National Association of community and restorative justice which promotes forms of [01:02:00] justice that are Equitable sustainable and socially constructive
to the brilliant folks who shared their insights Helena de Groot, Janine Genske, Peter Isely, and Phil Saviano
and to a few of our friends on patreon - you too can join this list of esteemed supporters at patreon.com/reckonings:
Abigail Farrell
Greg Berguig
Trevor Stutz
Tibet Sprague
Kenny Alston
Kyle Studstill
Rose Hulls
P Foster
Lafrey Whitbrod
Jordan A Patterson
and Christopher.
I'm Stephanie Lepp and if you made it all the way here, let me give one more Thank you to you for listening to Reckonings :)
