Diocese of Gallup

Bishop Donald Pelotte, SSS

Mass of Reconciliation for the benefit of those who have suffered from juvenile sexual abuse by priests

St. Joseph Catholic Church -- Winslow Arizona

Sunday, September 19, 2005

This past week, having returned on Thursday, September 15, 2005, I spent the whole week in Washington, D.C., as a member of the Bishop’s Administrative Committee. I represent Region 13. So I have to go four or five times a year to meetings to prepare primarily for the big meetings that we have in November and again in June.

We spent hours this week talking about how we as a Catholic community might best coordinate our response to the hurricane on the Gulf Coast. You know, many, many of those people who lost their homes in the devastating hurricane are Catholic people. The entire Archdiocese of New Orleans was wiped out. I had an additional connection because so many of those people from New Orleans were evacuated to Houston where my twin brother is the pastor of the parish that the Houston Astrodome is in.

So he spent hours in the Astrodome ministering as best he could to those people who have lost everything…. who have lost courage and soul and who are saying in news reports this morning, that even if they rebuild, they don’t want to return. And so the Bishops issued a statement called Hurricane Katrina, you will be able to pick it up on the internet a week from today, "reaching out" it says for renewal and recovery in faith and solidarity.

I shared this with you at the beginning of my homily because I want to use it as a point of departure to share and reflect with you on another terrible storm that has affected us. The storm of the juvenile sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic community. Especially as we have experienced it here in the United States.

I was much more sensitive to this issue when I assumed leadership of this Diocese in 1990 because of an experience my twin brother and I had when we were young. There was an old priest serving as chaplain for some contemplative Sisters. One day he took my twin and myself to his cottage in Maine and attempted to do something! I can’t remember exactly what it was, but thank God that we had the courage to go to my sainted mother and tell her about that and she had the wisdom to believe us and go to the priest and to say to him, - she only spoke French - and I won’t repeat the name she called him, If you touch my boys, I’ll kill you.

My Juvenile Sexual Abuse Review Board has been encouraging me for months to come to Winslow to reflect with you on what has happened here over the years. I have three members of the Review Board here, Fr. Ron Walters, a Franciscan from St. Michaels is here, and Dr. Margie Trujillo,  is here, she is a therapist from Farmington; she chairs the Review Board, and Mr. Floyd Kezele from Gallup, he’s an attorney and teaches law at the New Mexico University Branch in Gallup, my Chancellor, Timo and Sister Mary Thurlough, DC, our Victims Assistance Coordinator. They have been asking me to come and talk to you from my heart about what occurred here over the years, long before I was even...

In early May, I heard that some victims of abuse in this parish, three of them. And there was a fourth man from Phoenix. There was an outstanding meeting of honesty and pain for all of us and courage and healing. And that’s why I am here this morning to see if I can begin to include you as a parish community in the healing that needs to take place. Now, for some of you, you may not even recognize there was a problem or even accept that it was two priests that served you for many years who everyone assumed were outstanding priests were the most abusive priests in the Diocese. I talk of Fr. Clement Hageman ... I never new the man, he died in 1975. There are many victims of his misconduct sitting in this church right now. And then there was Fr. Jim Burns whom I got to know very, very well, and worked with -- he now is incarcerated. But the damage that they did in the lives of the young men here is enormous and horrific. All you need to do is as I have done is to sit one on one with the victim, male and female, of any kind of sexual abuse and listen to their story and they are almost incomprehensible. You would think that people would be making these up, just that they are true, they are painful for you.

So I am here as you Bishop to apologize to the Diocese of Gallup for all the pain and the damage and the hurt that has been done to this parish in my reign by these two priests during the 50s, 60s and 70s. What makes these stories I have heard so horrific, was because this was done by the misbehavior of few priests whom you expected to be men of integrity and honesty. People that you would hope you could trust. So in the name of the Church of the Catholic Diocese, I apologize. I have done this before from the Cathedral but, I think it was important to me to come to this parish and to say this to you. Many people have known for months that I was coming to do this, I know I’m competing with the Navajo County Fair, nonetheless it is important that for you people to get the word out that I came to see if I can help move your daily lives beyond where we are now.

I know there are victims out there who have not had the courage to come forward. I am willing to meet with any one of you personally, one on one, either at my office or here in Winslow or a place that might be easier for you so that you could begin to experience the healing. After this liturgy the members of my Review Board will be going over to the parish hall next to the parish rectory and Fr. Chacon will explain to them and there’s going to be an open forum with them for anything directly involved and address your concerns, questions and these are professional individuals who have been at this for some time. I know that this message will truly bring more healing to young people of the parish of St. Joseph.

Our scripture text talks about the call to discipleship. If you were not listening carefully, you might have thought that it was about an employer giving the same amount of wages to the person coming in by the evening to work. The message that St. Matthew is especially trying to bring out is that Jesus’ call is continuous. His call to discipleship happens daily and many times a day and we need to be open to respond faithfully to our call to discipleship.

I hope that as a result of this liturgy and as disciples of Jesus you will join me in trying to respond to that demands of discipleship all do all that needs to be done to cleans our church of this storm for the sake of our victims and parents of victims and friends and relatives. To work with me to create a safe place in this world for our children and to protect them. May the Lord who has begun this good work in you bring it to fulfillment.