CHICAGO (IL)
Chicago Tribune
June 13, 2019
By Ted Slowik
Walking into the Cathedral of St. Raymond in Joliet and seeing a display featuring the late Most Rev. Daniel Ryan triggers a flood of painful memories and unleashes a range of emotions.
I feel angry that the Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet would prominently display a picture of a cleric who engaged in sexual misconduct. I feel frustrated by how little seems to have changed, despite platitudes by church leaders about how much they have done to protect children.
I feel sadness about the apparent lack of understanding by church leaders and empathy for the many people I met and listened to over the years who shared with me their experiences of Joliet clergy who had sexually abused children.
I feel that if church leaders understood the depth of pain felt by survivors of childhood sexual abuse and truly cared about creating a culture where children are safe from sexual predators, they would remove the photo of Ryan from the display in the entryway to the cathedral.
I began hearing the stories, researching court files and investigating clergy abuse in the Joliet Diocese in 2002 while working for a Joliet newspaper. The work was emotionally draining. I felt obligated to share the stories of survivors at a time when few people in positions of authority in the church or state would advocate on their behalf.
Seventeen years later, I feel diocesan leaders still fail to grasp how the display of Ryan’s picture might offend people who were sexually abused by priests.
“It is one thing to acknowledge that an abuser worked at the parish, but quite another for his image to be displayed prominently,” said Zach Hiner, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.
“While it may seem minor to church officials, to survivors and supporters, small actions like this illustrate that church officials still do not fully understand the lifelong toll that abuse can have. If they did, they wouldn’t display these photos, prominently or otherwise,” Hiner said.
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