WASHINGTON (DC)
The Patriot-News
Sunday, July 17, 2005
BY BRETT LIEBERMAN
Of Our Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - Patricia Anne Cahill was 5 when a priest near her Ridgewood, N.J., home began molesting her.
The sexual abuse continued until she was 13.
"The nun that I went to for help and guidance when I was 15, she took me under her wing and into her bed," Cahill said.
"Nobody stopped her then and nobody takes any responsibility in the communities and congregations," Cahill said.
Now 52, and the co-leader of an abuse victims' support group chapter in Lancaster, Cahill was angry when she heard last week that Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., blamed "liberalism" for the Catholic church's sex abuse scandal.
"I'm irate over it," said Cahill, who lives in Lancaster County.