BUFFALO (NY)
WGRZ
March 5, 2018
By Claudine Ewing
A 52-year-old man living in Pennsylvania is speaking out for the first time about a case of sexual abuse. The man says he was 18 when he was allegedly sexually abused by a priest he met at St. Columban’s Retreat House in Derby.
“I’m coming forth now because I think there are a number of other people who need to know they are not alone,” said a 52-year old man who asked that his identity not be revealed.
The man said he was 18-years-old when he lost his virginity to a now deceased Catholic priest. He met the Columban Father at the Columban Retreat House in Derby in the 1980’s. They are a missionary society, they are not Diocesan priests, but are often stationed and working in a Diocese.
Now as an adult, he reflects on how wrong it was for the priest to befriend him and then sexually abuse him. “How could an 18-year-old boy, child, who was intoxicated be able to give any kind of consent to anything by a priest who was at least old enough to be his father if not grandfather,” said the alleged victim in an interview with 2 On Your Side’s Claudine Ewing. “I visited him at that time in Chicago and after being given alcohol, and the two of us drinking, I fell asleep on the floor in the living room of his apartment.” He said he was then sexually abused.
The priest died in 1995. The Buffalo Diocese will not say if the priest is on a list of clergy accused of sexual abuse.
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