Voice of the Faithful Long Island had John Salveson, who had been abused by a priest, speak at one of their meetings. The talk is excellent and is posted here. I hope that people who heard the talk were able to pick up a few things that I noticed. I have found that many of the stories of abuse by priests have some similar threads.

“I went through a long period as a child when I aspired to be a priest. I can still remember being fascinated by the book The Making of a Priest, which I would read at night under the covers of my bed with the aid of a flashlight, when I was supposed to be asleep.”

So those who contend that the vocation crisis is in part a result of corruption are correct, this person may or may not have had a vocation but being abused certainly would have squelched it.

“..in 1969, I met Father Robert Huneke, a new priest in our parish. He was young, smart, funny and sarcastic. He had us call him Father Bob and quickly became popular”

Beware of priests who want to appear to be just like anyone else.

“He was the sponsor of our Folk Mass group and was instrumental in getting us all to sign up for "Christian Awakening" a weekend retreat program involving several Long Island parishes. He let us smoke cigarettes around him and criticized the other parish priests in front of us. He swore. He was like no other priest I had ever met.”

Classic –allowed children to smoke, cursed AND criticized other priests in front of children. I have seen so many stories of abusive priests who criticized others in front of people- no real priest would do this. Of course, to immature children this is “cool” so it is done by pedophiles to win their favor.

“Over breakfast, Father Bob told me that what "we" did was okay. He explained that it was okay to show love for each other, and that God accepted and encouraged it.”

This is familiar, people trying to encourage disgusting behavior by justifying it as “love” that God accepts.

“I wrote to Bishop John Mc Gann of the Diocese of Rockville Centre on Long Island in 1980, telling him of my abuse and asking him to let me know what had happened to Father Huneke.”

Many Catholics on Long Island knew Bishop McGann was not doing his duty as a Bishop in many ways, but they were ignored and called “conservative” “old fashioned” and “rigid”.

“My first attempt to "go public" and expose the abuse involved speaking to a reporter at Newsday, Long Island's most widely read newspaper. The paper wouldn't publish the story. The reporter, a religion writer assigned to the story, told me I seemed more like some sort of "Teacher’s pet" to her than an abuse victim. The editors suggested that if I located other victims they might consider an article… By the end of the evening, I had a list of about 10 other victims of Father Huneke. The newspaper was still uncomfortable with the story, despite my new revelations.”

So Newsday remained silent when faced with a case of sexual abuse of a minor?? Interesting.

The talk ends on a beautiful note:

“Father Hesburgh got off the train in Baltimore. He reached above me for his travel bag, shook my hand and started to walk down the aisle. About halfway off the train, he turned and walked back to me. He said, "If no one has said it to you, I apologize for what happened to you". No one had ever said that to me. To this day, he remains the only priest who has said it. It meant more to me than he will ever know.”

This was a great testimony by this victim and I applaud Voice of the Faithful for having him speak. I think this choice of speaker towers over their choice of Richard McBrien. I just hope that people who read this speech, or heard it live, will see some of the things that I noticed. A good priest would never encourage sin, bad mouth people in front of children, or try to say homosexual sex is accepted by God. No good bishop would tolerate this type of behavior from a priest when confronted with it.