I Am a Convert I See Where Molested Catholic Tshirts Work, City of Angels, August 26, 2009

I Am a Convert. I See Where Molested Catholic T-shirts Work.

City of Angels
August 26, 2009

http://cityofangels5.blogspot.com/2009/08/i-am-convert-i-see-where-molested.html

When Cindy Falter joined Walk Across Oregon last Sunday wearing the Molested Catholic t-shirt, I know a few people became uncomfortable - at the Powell's City of Books entrance, as well as in our group of activists. Words on the t-shirt are in-your-face: I was molested by Dirty Filthy Sex Starved Catholics. Would you let a priest or nun babysit your children?

If anyone found the t-shirt offensive or wanted to start an argument, well, Cindy had her two Great Dane service dogs with her (in photos here). As Cindy spoke I would break in with: “We have to talk to people one at a time on the street, because mainstream media will never tell the entire story of the pedophiles and how they operate in the Catholic Church. The Church intimidates corporate media to bury the details. So we are telling the story to one person at a time, walking through the city in these t-shirts.”

Cindy survived a three year period, grades one through three, of serial molest by George Neville Rucker when he was a priest in El Segundo, California, in the 1960s. He would take her out of the classroom into the rectory and sacristy and rape her. The school nuns saw what was taking place, heard Cindy scream she did not want to go, and still forced her to leave the classroom and join him over and over. No one stopped it. Cindy tells a tale so horrific it takes words like those on the Molested Catholic t-shirt to begin the introduction, to prepare listeners for what they are about to hear. Then Cindy has an open door to begin to explain just how bad the crimes were.

And people listen.

Maybe it’s because we were in Portland, Oregon, a city known for its intelligent and progressive population, and we were outside a huge used bookstore, which would attract the more intelligent and progressive of the population, but it was remarkable to me how effective it was for Cindy to stand there and draw a crowd with that t-shirt, then tell the story.

I hope to meet up with Cindy again soon to walk down another street, or stand on another corner, and strike up this conversation. We may just show up soon in a city near you. . .

I didn't think I could wear the t-shirt in public myself, but after seeing how effective the words on the t-shirt are as, well, a conversation starter, I might wear one next time. When Cindy stood outside Powell's City of Books, I saw people stop, and then listen, then stay stopped, and continue to listen, and of course, she has her dogs.

Meanwhile City of Angels and staff just got in late last night on Amtrak. This morning I can't open any of my video files, so until my Technical Crew (daughter) wakes up I can't see them yet. More posts with more photos AND VIDEO will appear later today or tomorrow, for now I may join my staff and get some more restttttt-zzzz