When one in ten children are abused I can’t help but ask why would anyone not want child abuse exposed?
I’ll leave you to draw your own conclusions.
Had my sister, Alice, and I, not lived in an orphanage, where abuse was swept under the rug, I might not be so rabid in my attack. I stood in the place of the homeless, of one abused. Because I was there, I became more vocal. Had I not been pretty much a helpless victim myself, I might still shrink into the shadows and keep my mouth shut. I say “pretty much helpless” because I possessed that rare courage to expose one who had unmercifully beaten a ten year old girl. Only God could have given me that raw courage because I was a really shy, undersized girl of fourteen, who took justice into her own hands.
I was on a mission in the 60’s and I decided this would be how I would spend my life, taking up for the children who have no voice. I could have kept my mouth shut but I can only feel good for the little girl who stood up for those more timid than myself.
In the Donna Reed days church people appeared to be more comfortable keeping their blinders on, while sweeping the dirt under the rug, as helpless victims emotionally died in despair or ran away from the home.
The orphanage tried to keep abuse away from the media. One little girl was even placed in a mental hospital, all the while hoping this would keep her mouth shut.
It took me forty-five years to find her. When I located her, she told me that she wouldn’t talk to the therapists for eight months and only then when they put her under truth serum.
The doctors could tell she was telling the truth so they sent her home to her mother.
Still justice wasn’t served.
Where will this all end? Will children ever really be heard?
Only time will tell but I see hope on the horizon as more sexually assaulted victims are being vindicated today.
I wonder how many more cases are being unheard while these same children turn to crime just to survive?
Looking back on my teenage years, I know that reporting the abuse helped to protect my hide, because the employees of the home feared the “powers that be” and they knew in their heart that I really wasn’t scared of them.
Now it would be harder to report the abuse because the orphanage, which has moved and changed their name, home schools the children, shielding the victims from the public eye.
Today, in 2016, a house parent, from that orphanage is serving time in prison for repeatedly raping and sodomizing a young girl in 2003. She was only able to report the abuse when she visited her parents.
I can’t help but question how many young children are suffering at the hands of an institution who is collecting money from the coffers of good Christian people who are trying to make a difference in a child’s life.
The Bible still says that “the truth will set you free.”
If we don’t protect children who will?
Contact Sarah at [email protected]