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*PS In a few months time Penguin will publish Ann Thompson's book "Say Sorry" which tells the dark underbelly that also accompanied the work of these women who set up orphanages like the Home of the Good Shepherd in Western Australia. Ann, who contributes to our discussion board as Ann Free Spirit, tells of her harrowing experiences in institutional care in New Zealand**.
We need to remain constantly humbled, and reminded, of that reverse side of the ledger that accompanied the many positive things that were achieved. I still almost vomit thinking of the cruelty, the hypocrisy, and ultimately the criminality of the principal nun who caused so much grief in the life of Ann. Herself, caught by the girls in the orphanage in the bed of the priest who raped Ann, I wonder how she could have ever been allowed the freedom to operate in such an institution caring for the most vulnerable in society?
In so many ways that woman, I am sure, was more "prisoner" than the inmates she was supposed to be caring for were "prisoners". And then there is the hypocrisy of the institution that for so long ran around saying "but Sister So and So would never engage in those sort of activities and how could you accuse good Father So and So of engaging in that behaviour?!"
As I said, it made me almost want to vomit when I read the story. And some of those in positions of authority do not yet seem to understand the message that the institution needs to "clean up its act".
Ann's story, in a funny (curious) way, is also a recapitulation of the story that Jerome Murphy OConner relates of the journey of Paul. The ugly duckling that no one wants to know or care about ends up as the princess bestriding all the kings and queens and popes. In so many ways it might be claimed Paul, rather than Peter, was the first Pope and the real father of the Church. The "little man" who became the collosus of Catholic thinking!
**I should also point out part credit for Ann's book attracting the attention of one of the largest book publishers in the world has to go to Barry Sinclair also from our community. Altogether this is another product (perhaps it might end up being the biggest product if it ends up on the silver screen, which I think it might?) of the old CathNews Discussion Board that was closed down without apology and without explanation by the bishops, or by Fr Michael Kelly SJ, to the community that met there. Serves you right, gentlemen. Your absolute and total arrogance in that matter was breathtaking.
Brian Coyne
[Editor & Publisher]
My email to the producers at Compass...
by Brian Coyne , LINDEN, NSW, Monday, March 16, 2009, 13:01 (224 days ago)
Dear Compass crew,
Further to my discussion with Sarah in your office today...
At Catholica we have for about six years been assisting a woman in New Zealand who suffered one of the most horrific forms of abuse ever in Catholic orphanages. Ann is now 67 years of age and was essentially even deprived of an education because of the abuse she was subjected to, including rape by a priest.
On June 1st this year her story is finally going to be published by Penguin New Zealand. Here is the cover of the book...
I have read one of the late manuscripts before the book went to the printer and have a copy of the pdf just received of the final version. I believe this book has a quality of "naive writing" similar to that which proved so successful for Fremantle Arts Centre Press with the late Albert Facey's book "A Fortunate Life" which, as you would appreciate, is an icon today of Australian literature. I suspect that is one of the reasons why Penguin have picked this story up. The other is that Ann herself tracked down Fr Tom Doyle, the American priest who has done so much to expose the abuse scandals in America and internationally and he has written a powerful epilogue to the book that, in itself, will generate major news headlines when the book is published.
The book will be launched on 1st June. Ann has sent me through the name of the contact person she's dealing with at Penguin.
Philippa Muller
Publicist
Penguin Group (NZ)
(a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)
67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0745, Auckland, NZ
Ph: +64 9 442 7463 Mob: +64 0275 707 112 Fax: +64 9 442 7401
philippa.muller@nz.penguingroup.com
penguin.co.nz
If I can be of further assistance please do not hesitate to contact me. There are quite a few people I could also put you onto who could testify to the obnoxious treatment that Ann continues to be subjected to by priests and other self-righteous Catholics on the internet discussion forums where she has attempted to tell her story. I was formerly a relief editor at CathNews and co-administrator of their discussion forum and that's where I first became aware of Ann Thompson's situation about 6 or 7 years ago.
Kind regards to you all, and thanks for the wonderful service Compass provides to our nation. Last night's program is what has finally caused me to get off my butt and alert you to this story.
Brian Coyne
Editor & Publisher
Catholica
www.catholica.com.au
Brian Coyne
[Editor & Publisher]
A further note I sent through to Ann...
by Brian Coyne , LINDEN, NSW, Monday, March 16, 2009, 13:32 (224 days ago)
Ann,
I
should also explain to you the term "naive writing" which I have used in
the emails I've sent to Compass and Penguin. That, in publishers'
terms, is a very complimentary endorsement of your writing style. It
means "raw writing, written from the heart, in plain, everyday language
that most people can empathise with". I don't know if you yet appreciate
it but that is an enormous asset you have.
I just wanted to
forewarn you of this because some idiots, like [names deleted], are the
sort who might try to latch on to a term like "naive writing" and turn
it into something else. It is a highly complimentary term in the eyes of
publishers so don't be put off by what any of these idiots we have to
deal with might try and say. Stick in there. I suspect you are going to
be run off your feet with requests for media interviews as the
publication date draws closer. Don't be daunted by that. Just continue
to tell your story in your own words and as honestly as you have
attempted to tell it to us over all these years. Be prepared though that
some Catholics will get very upset by this and might view you as public
enemy number 1. In publishing this book you are threatening the very
core of their security in life — this Church which they see as incapable
of doing any wrong. When you come across them just remember they are a
tiny, tiny minority and you have legions more support than they can
muster. There are now many people who are right behind you in telling
your story, and the story of other women who were subjected to similar
treatment.
Cheers,
Brian Coyne
[Editor & Publisher]
[Editor & Publisher]
I have been deeply moved by what you have written and how you
have written it. My respect for you has always been strong from when
you first appeared all those years ago now on the old CNDB. in 2001
I really have to say though that it is even deeper now having read your story
from beginning to end. With Fr Tom Doyle's endorsement and more academic comment
on top of all that you have written this is extremely powerful testimony.
It's ironic given all that you have been put through, all the education that was denied you,
all the natural justice that was denied you, that you emerge out of all this as
one of the best models of what Jesus Christ came into the world to teach us all.
That IS the promise of Christ: the first shall be last — and the last shall be first.
Your own sense of justice is awesome. I am equally impressed by Brian,
and all the other people whom you have attracted to support you —
your ex-policeman friend, your editor Fiona, Tom Doyle.
That is all testimony to the strength and beauty of your character.
Don't lose any sleep over the [name deleted]-type characters. There will
be plenty more of them who are going to be envious now of your "success"
and they will attempt to attack.
Even Bishop Geoffrey Robinson has had to put up with that from within
the highest ranks in the Vatican bureaucracy. What will best protect you against
all that is precisely what you have been doing all along: "seeking truth".
There is an old Latin phrase for it — the motto of my old school, taken from
St Thomas Aquinas: "Veritas Vincit — Truth Conquers". It does.
You help prove it in the most marvellous of ways. I can't underline enough
how important the work is that you Have been engaged in.
This is worth a thousand degrees in Divinity at the Gregorian. Yours truly is
"the story that Jesus came to model to the world" — it's the Garden of Gesthemane
story all over again written in the pain you have experienced over an entire lifetime.
You remind me of my own mother who was also one who "stuck to her tasks",
was "guided ultimately only by truth alone" and who always claimed to have
"her two feet stuck firmly on the ground".
You do have enormous strength of character also.
Quietly and patiently stick at what you're doing. I do have a real sense
that you are going to "succeed" in a spectacular way and find the justice
and that deep sense of peace and a sense of overwhelming fulfilment of
the value of your life and all that you have been put through. Christ invites
us to transform our pains into joy and love.
You may not be able to fully realise it at the moment but effectively
that is what you and Brian have been doing.
Hang in there. There might be a few more glitches until you find the right
publisher and distributor combination. I suspect even if you found a publisher
tomorrow that it won't be until February or March next year before a book is
finally available for sale in shops.
Then, if it's as successful as we hope it might be, it might be a year or two
before you begin to see any significant financial return.
You'll possibly need a little more patience yet.
I have been deeply moved by what you have written and how you
have written it. My respect for you has always been strong from when
you first appeared all those years ago now on the old CNDB. in 2001
I really have to say though that it is even deeper now having read your story
from beginning to end. With Fr Tom Doyle's endorsement and more academic comment
on top of all that you have written this is extremely powerful testimony.
It's ironic given all that you have been put through, all the education that was denied you,
all the natural justice that was denied you, that you emerge out of all this as
one of the best models of what Jesus Christ came into the world to teach us all.
That IS the promise of Christ: the first shall be last — and the last shall be first.
Your own sense of justice is awesome. I am equally impressed by Brian,
and all the other people whom you have attracted to support you —
your ex-policeman friend, your editor Fiona, Tom Doyle.
That is all testimony to the strength and beauty of your character.
Don't lose any sleep over the [name deleted]-type characters. There will
be plenty more of them who are going to be envious now of your "success"
and they will attempt to attack.
Even Bishop Geoffrey Robinson has had to put up with that from within
the highest ranks in the Vatican bureaucracy. What will best protect you against
all that is precisely what you have been doing all along: "seeking truth".
There is an old Latin phrase for it — the motto of my old school, taken from
St Thomas Aquinas: "Veritas Vincit — Truth Conquers". It does.
You help prove it in the most marvellous of ways. I can't underline enough
how important the work is that you Have been engaged in.
This is worth a thousand degrees in Divinity at the Gregorian. Yours truly is
"the story that Jesus came to model to the world" — it's the Garden of Gesthemane
story all over again written in the pain you have experienced over an entire lifetime.
You remind me of my own mother who was also one who "stuck to her tasks",
was "guided ultimately only by truth alone" and who always claimed to have
"her two feet stuck firmly on the ground".
You do have enormous strength of character also.
Quietly and patiently stick at what you're doing. I do have a real sense
that you are going to "succeed" in a spectacular way and find the justice
and that deep sense of peace and a sense of overwhelming fulfilment of
the value of your life and all that you have been put through. Christ invites
us to transform our pains into joy and love.
You may not be able to fully realise it at the moment but effectively
that is what you and Brian have been doing.
Hang in there. There might be a few more glitches until you find the right
publisher and distributor combination. I suspect even if you found a publisher
tomorrow that it won't be until February or March next year before a book is
finally available for sale in shops.
Then, if it's as successful as we hope it might be, it might be a year or two
before you begin to see any significant financial return.
You'll possibly need a little more patience yet.
If it doesn't draw out in any reader the full gamut of emotions from trauma, sadness, tears, anger, joy, admiration, exhaustion, and even a sense of utter frustration that reader has neither a heart nor a soul.
The one big thing that confounds me about life is the seeming random
way in which wealth and poverty, grief and bliss, pain and joy are
distributed amongst us human beings. Some seem to be able to breeze
through life with no significant worries yet others seem to lurch from
one crisis to another. There seems to be no logic to this part of the
design of Creation. Even within my own family I see some with a
seemingly blessed life and others who struggle. Those who are blessed
always seem to believe they were responsible of course because of their
cleverness, astuteness, temperance, cautiousness, prayers or whatever
quality they place great value on. It's an old question of course.
The Book of Job explores this conundrum of life in detail. When I look at the Foster family I wonder how God could have allowed so much pain and tragedy to descend on one household? It evokes in me similar feelings to those I felt when I learned of what Ann Thompson went through in Catholic orphanages in New Zealand. (Ann is a member of the Catholica community and her book "Say Sorry: A Harrowing Childhood in Catholic Orphanages" was published by Penguin NZ.) At the same time in both the stories of Ann and Brian Thompson and Chrissie and Anthony Foster I also sense some kind of heroism. It's not just having to live through this level of pain, the courage to overcome the embarrassment and humiliation and tell the story publicly is almost unbearable — more so when you are arraigned against one of the oldest and once most powerful institutions on earth that was able to bring kings to their knees.
Further information about Ann Thompson's book can be found in the Catholica Marketeplace at:
www.catholica.com.au/marketplace/fishpondau/SaySorry.php
Available now! (Ships in 24 Hours)
THE PRICES ON THIS PAGE ARE IN AUSTRALIAN DOLLARS!
NEW ZEALAND BUYERS GO TO THE NZ PAGE TO SAVE ON POSTAGE
The story of Ann Thompson an indefatigable fighter for those who were abused...
[+]Enlarge Image |
Say Sorry: A Harrowing Childhood in Catholic Orphanages
ISBN: 9780143011842
Author(s):
by Ann Thompson Publisher: Penguin Books (NZ)
BOOK DESCRIPTION:
Conceived out of wedlock in 1941, Ann
was just two months old when she was placed in the care of a Catholic
orphanage in Christchurch, New Zealand. From the beginning, she was
taught her mother was sinful and that she would be too unless the devil
was beaten from her soul. She was physically and sexually abused by
religious and lay staff at the orphanage from an early age and was
forced to work long hours on the orphanage farm and later in the
laundries. In 1997, when Ann watched a
Prime Television documentary exposing the decades of abuse by the Good
Shepherd nuns at the Christchurch orphanage, she realised hers wasn't
the only lost childhood. Ann's battle
to get authorities within the Catholic Church to accept responsibility
for the past institutionalised abuse of children and young people in its
care is entering its eleventh year. She is committed to communicating
truthfully and openly about the abuse inflicted on her, and its ongoing
consequences, until the church acknowledges culpability and
admits—unconditionally—that there was wrongdoing.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Ann Thompson
is a regular contributor
to the Catholica Forum and other discussion boards. She now lives in
Whangarei, on the North Island of New Zealand with her husband and
children.
Say Sorry: A Harrowing Childhood in Catholic
Orphanages: by Ann Thompson:
Paperback OUR PRICE AU$20.97
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