Comments on: So it was true, after all

By: Amanda Mallia

Amanda Mallia — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 20:00:46 +0000

It was today announced that Lourdes home will be (or are trying to) rehouse the 10 children currently in their care … to make way for an old people’s home.

Let us hope that the elderly people eventually housed there will not be at the receiving end of any mistreatment.

By: Daphne Caruana Galizia

Daphne Caruana Galizia — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:50:57 +0000

@Carmel Scicluna – xejn ma naqbel mieghek. Allahares l-ghalliema u l-genituri kolla kienu jaggixxu bhal dawk is-sorijiet, bl-iskuza tal-kultura ta’ dak iz-zmien.

By: Daphne Caruana Galizia

Daphne Caruana Galizia — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:47:11 +0000

@europarl – I don’t think Kurt is a nice guy at all, but a fool and a liar. He was responsible for the harassment of my son at the university debate, and he also wrote a story for Maltastar.com, under his by-line, claiming that I attacked him and yelled at him, when I did nothing but sit quietly (and the cameras show me doing so). He even put between quotation marks the ‘aggressive comments’ I am supposed to have made to him. He’s obviously got a problem, whatever it is….maybe he was nice to you because of your politics?

By: Carmel Scicluna

Carmel Scicluna — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 13:53:12 +0000

Is-sorijiet in kwistjoni li abbuzaw it-tfal b'dak il-mod fahxi wettqu li wettqu mhux minhabba dak li qalet Daphne fl-artiklu imma minhabba l-kultura fizikament, emozzjonalment u lingwistikament vjolenti li konna mgharrqin fiha f'dawk is-snin. Hafna nies kattivi, hafna vittmi vulnerabbli. Infakkarkom f'xi ezempji. Il-prim ministru ta' Malta Dom Mintoff: ''Min irid glieda naghmillu gwerra.'' Dr. Fenech Adami mghajjar ''il-vavu tal-harqa'' Missirijiet lil uliedhom: ''Jekk ma tobdinix naqlaghlek ghajnejk u nhabbtek mal-hajt.'' U mbux is-sorijiet biss jafu jkunu vjolenti. Niftakarni Form 2. Il-vici-rettur tal-kullegg jghajjarni quddiem l-amministraturi l-ohra fl-ufficju tieghu meta farfarthielu f'hogru li kont se ndawwar denbi lilhinn minn dak l-infern ta' skola tal-Knisja fejn kont nigi bullied regolarment: ''Int trid tmur il-Junior Lyceum lanqas taf tikteb ismek!''

By: europarl

europarl — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 09:28:18 +0000

Daphne, I met Kurt a few times when he visited our zoo here. He’s a nice guy, really, not the type who tries to compensate for his shortcomings by playing god’s gift to the human species.

By: Daphne Caruana Galizia

Daphne Caruana Galizia — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 07:29:53 +0000

@europarl: funny you should say that about cork-sized men (qisu tapp). It’s exactly what I think Kurt Farrugia’s fundamental problem is (editor of Maltastar.com) and told him so the other day.

By: Mario Debono

Mario Debono — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:24:02 +0000

Thank God for the Jesuits and St Aloysius. Althogh there was a priest who was a paedophile, we never had any problems with him. We had an enlightened education. Not so the nuns school i wnet to previously. The nuns of St Monica were particularly sadistic to us boys…..just because we were boys. They didnt like us and i remember several incidents that did them no credit.

By: freethinker

freethinker — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:07:15 +0000

In connection with institutions run by religious orders and secrecy in relation to scandals, it is interesting to read from Judge Giovanni Bonello’s “Murder in a Hospital Monastery” (Histories of Malta, vol. VII, p.22). Bonello writes that when in the 17th century “a paedophilia scandal rocked the holy and well-deserving Piarist order, the main efforts of the founder of that worthy congregation, the unbearably saintly San Giuseppe Calasanz, concentrated on ensuring that not a trace of information trickled out of the convent walls, and evidence of the sexual assaults of some preying friars on minors in their care, ended effectively out of reach of the hierarchy”. Calasanz urged the investigator of the scandal to “cover up this great shame”. So far, nothing exceptional except that nothing has changed since then. What is much more astonishing is that, according to Bonello (and the Encycopedia Britannica online), “Calasanz is today patron saint of Catholic schools”. Well…with patron saints like that…

By: Phaedra Giuliani

Phaedra Giuliani — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 19:03:26 +0000

I guess many of us who came in contact with nuns have a story to tell within this context. Suffice it to say that the weird wimples and the long dark habits were very daunting to kids (I could swear that some of them had eyes in the back of their heads – wimple and all);but it is good to remember that just because there is a bad apple (or two, or three) in the apple cart, one cannot write off the whole lot of them. Most are doing sterling work in the community.

By: europarl

europarl — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 16:39:41 +0000

The nuns’ world is the mysterious world I had to confront upon my first exposure outside my family circle.

Between the ages of 4 and 11 I attended St Emilie de Vialar School, also known as “St Joseph tar-Rabat”, a nun’s school with a handful of Irish sisters.

I cannot say we were mistreated, but a fat, hairy Maltese nun by the quirky name of Sister Deodolinda was of the very nasty Gestapo type.

Once a kid who had not eaten his meal, but whose fork had been collected, was forced to eat the remainder with a dirty fork she picked up from a lot while hitting his face like a mad cow.

To me it looked like a tough ordeal and I remember feeling particularly sorry for the chap – this adult tantrum was no joke… and having to eat your cold leftovers with someone else’s fork… well, kids are very touchy on such things.

My general impression of nuns: an emotionally repressed lot – but some of them were okay. The Irish nuns seemed the more rational, while some Maltese nuns were nearly illiterate and did odd jobs, like sister Deodolinda (or “Sister Five-Syllables”, as she was called by Sister Kevin – who incidentally favoured me in no small way simply because I was the first Kevin she had ever taught in Malta).

…but after the nuns, the brothers at De La Salle Cottage weren’t any better, especially with a cork-sized headmaster whom we considered a neurotic, self-engrandised sadist on the best of days. Now, what I really learned from that tiny man is how good it is to be taller than average (with apologies to short men – no hard feelings).