You know what I am exhausted about, is the way people ask what can they do to help end abuse, when what they really mean, is I will do anything, as long as it doesn't change my life.
I am also tired of folks coming to the rescue of the older generation giving them the shadow of doubt that they didn't know. They didn't know that the children were being abused.
Really?
Here is the deal. They knew. They knew for they kept their children away.
They knew, for they blessed it away.
They knew the children suffered, but they also knew that their faith was the most important card in the game. It trumped the children's lives.
We can't solve the problem, when we refuse to call a spade a spade.
We have to first find out what the problem is.
To assume the generation before us didn't know, is to view us in the same light. We didn't know.
No, we know.
We know, but we don't want our lives to change, so we know, but do nothing.
When they ask what they can do, what they want is to do anything, as long as it doesn't touch their faith. As long as it doesn't change their relationships with their families and friends. As long as it doesn't make them behave differently. As long as their lives, as I said, remain unchanged.
This is what makes abuse flourish, the inability to course correct.
The inability to look into the faith that blessed the sinners called pedophiles.
The inability to do what your 'faith' won't allow.
What I see most, are folks who are holding in front of them the things that they hold dear...Faith and Family.
If abuse comes in, they will not give up those two cards, no matter what.
If it is a father/son who abuses, they will not walk away...they see the son label or father label before pedophile and abuser.
If the churches ask to bless the sins, they will, before they go to the court of the land, or instead of.
We keep dancing around this like you all are wanting to help or have helped, when in fact, what many and most do, is hold on to what they hold dear, refusing to change when abuse walks in.
In fact, you will reinforce your faith and family...doing more to keep them in place, making the wall harder to penetrate. There is no place for abuse in your faith or family, None.
I am sick and tired of well meaning folks pretending to want to help, while holding out in front of them is the wall of religion and family. These sacred walls where they believe no evil lurks and flourishes.
The evil twin to evil is this belief.
That not in my faith.
Not in my house.
Not in my family.
The refusal to let go of faith and family is the biggest detriment to solving the problems of abuse.
It is the hurdle we can't penetrate.
And the same hurdle that keeps abuse safe inside.
It won't leak to the outside...for faith and family hold them up as 'normal'.
Who will be the ones to lay down their faith and beliefs of their families...to see what the children are going through. To be the one to stop pedophiles in their early years or in their middle years or will we all wait until, like my father, they have 45 years of abusing.
My mother would not put down her marriage her dreams of family and certainly NOT her faith.
Who will?
I am just tired of the well intentioned folks acting like they are standing against abuse, when what they are standing for is their faith and belief in the solid wholeness of a family that is steeped in abuse.
Just say it.
I am for family no matter what.
My faith is more important than the lives of innocent children.
Don't ask what you can do, until you are willing to lose it all.
For now, there are so many children who feel that they come third or forth in line.
They are not even close. And, they know this, feel it and understand, that since they are not faith, they are not first. Since their truth will rip apart a family you hold dear, they stay silent.
It isn't the children that are not brave. It is you.
You are not sure enough of your faith to question it.
You are not sure enough of your family to investigate it.
You are not sure enough of your friends to put up boundaries.
You are not sure your life as you know it can stand the scrutiny it will go under, if you allow truth to enter in.
Just know, that while you are holding faith and family dear, the pedophiles are behind that wall, damaging child upon child. They can for you are looking at your faith and family, disregarding any tones of abuse that bounce off the wall.
Stop asking what you can do and start asking what you would let go in order to save one child.
