Pederasts, not paedophiles
This is my column in The Malta Independent today.
Charles Pulis and Godwin Scerri have been found guilty of sexual crimes against boys aged 13 to 16. Yet we persist in calling them ‘paedophile priests’.
They are priests no longer, and paedophiles are sexually attracted to children, not to adolescents. Once a child reaches puberty after the age of 12, paedophiles are just not interested.
These men are textbook pederasts: older men who cultivate adolescent boys for sex and who, unable to obtain what they want within the law or by consent, violate both the boy and the law.
The distinction is an important one, not least because it is ridiculous to describe sex with a 16-year-old as a paedophile act. Pulis’s and Scerri’s crimes are no less abhorrent for that, but they are of a different order.
It is a shame that the proceedings were conducted behind closed doors because there are many aspects on which we need clarity. I do not mean the testimony of the victims, because I had the privilege – if you can call it that; it was anything but – of hearing it first hand, and I couldn’t sleep properly for weeks afterwards.
I still feel sick when I think about it and no, I really don’t think much of it was fit for publication.
What struck me most, what upset me most, was not the sexual perversity and depredation as such, but the utter and callous cruelty to boys who had been deprived of material comfort and starved of love, cut adrift by their parents, from birth or just a few years old.
Was it the rape that got me most?
No, it was the cruel manipulation that preceded it: Godwin Scerri returning from Canada and calling up to his room a boy he knew had been placed in an orphanage at birth, who had never received a present or an ounce of love or attention in his life, and telling him: “I’ve brought you a present from Canada”.
And then, when the boy runs eagerly to his room (“I was so excited,” he told me. “I had never had a present before.”), the bastard goes for him and afterwards gives him the present – a piece of chocolate.
Meanwhile, another boy sees him enter the room and, aware of the danger, tries to protect him by hammering on the door and calling for him.
I haven’t yet read the 100-page judgement and so don’t know whether it contains any recommendations for the psychiatric treatment of these men or what should be done about them once they have served their sentence.
I don’t know whether psychiatrists examined the men and submitted their expert reports to the court, though I would assume that this was a necessary part of the exercise.
But I did note that the magistrate made specific reference to Charles Pulis’s testimony, when he actually made a point of saying that he was raised with hatred for homosexuals. He had learned to accept them because that’s what the priesthood taught him – but he continued to be suspicious of them and even warned the boys to be careful of a homosexual man who came to help out at the home.
People have accused the two of becoming priests to gain access to children. I think they are wrong, not least because Pulis and Scerri are interested in adolescent and pubescent boys and not in children.
My own view is that they entered the priesthood because celibacy gave them an excuse – or so they mistakenly believed – to avoid having to confront their own sexuality and their burgeoning interest in men.
Raised to hate homosexuals, in a Catholic village society that regarded that sort of thing as the worst abomination, they would have been unable to admit even to themselves that they are homosexual.
Forcing themselves on adolescent boys, who had all the necessary attributes of men while not being men yet, would have allowed Pulis – the self-confessed hater of homosexuals – to fool himself into thinking that he wasn’t homosexual himself, because it wasn’t technically another man he was having sex with.
This same strain of self-delusion is evident in the words of Anthony Mercieca, the Gozitan priest who shot to worldwide notority when the American politician Mark Foley accused him of inappropriate behaviour towards him when he was a boy.
In an interview with US television, Mercieca (see my previous post) spoke in terms of brotherly love, joyousness and that his behaviour was appropriate because there was no penetration. Why shouldn’t he have massaged the boy? Massages parlours exist – and more in that vein.
If we look at these sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church right across the world, it quickly becomes obvious that the vast majority of the priests involved are old or have reached the end of middle age. They grew up in a very different world, and took their socially unacceptable sexuality, or their sexuality which had been warped by their upbringing, into the priesthood as a form of refuge.
That refuge of theirs became a living hell for thousands of children and adolescents.
It was the same with nuns. At the convent where I was schooled, it was quite obvious that one or two of the nuns were lesbians in hiding even from themselves. They did not prey on the girls – women are differently inclined to men in that way, and even if they were not, there is no passion-killer greater than blue checked crimplene – but because they were not nuns out of conviction they were miserable, and misery made them cruel to their charges.
It is not just changes in the way candidates for the priesthood are recruited and assessed which have put an end to this state of affairs, but the changes in society. When was the last time a priest in his 20s or 30s was accused of inappropriate behaviour towards his charges?
Homosexual adolescents no longer shunt themselves into the priesthood as a way of escaping what is happening to them, there to grow into adult men who, because they cannot countenance a one-to-one equal relationship with another man, force themselves on their adolescent charges instead.
Paedophiles, meanwhile, have no need to go to the great extreme of taking holy orders to gain access to children because satisfying the urges of paedophiles has become a lucrative international industry that defeats the best efforts of governments and police forces to destroy it.
Instead of entering the priesthood, determined paedophiles now simply catch a flight to Thailand and stay there.
With this ground-breaking case, the days are now gone when Maltese society accepted a situation in which abusive priests were reported to the bishop rather than to the police commissioner. But it wasn’t that long ago when we took just such a state of affairs for granted as normal.
16 Comments Comment
Reply to ciccio2011 Click here to cancel reply
“With this ground-breaking case, the days are now gone when Maltese society accepted a situation in which abusive priests were reported to the bishop rather than to the police commissioner.”
Are you so sure? I thought that after this ground-breaking case, parents are still more likely to report cases to the bishop, because they are afraid of the commissioner of pulis.
Skimming through the judgement, I was struck at the lewd acts performed on the boys.
However, the accused pleaded their innocence and Pulis was also supported by a professional witness whereas the boys were made out to be from ‘broken homes’ or criminal families to diminish their integrity.
The judge noted contradictions in the version of events of the time the accused were away from Malta due to passports submitted as evidence (big mistake of the defence). I feel that the case was won on the credibility of events as recalled by the boys.
For the rape acquittal, this might not necessarily be a mistake by the prosecution but perhaps to a statement by one of the boys.
[Daphne – It was a mistake by the police. The magistrate said he had no doubt the crime was committed but the wrong location was down on the charge sheet.]
Can’t they charge him again for that crime?
I think the police and the media have not dug deep enough in this case yet. The Times reports that:
“[in 2003] After hearing the evidence of the people involved, the Response Team (led by Judge Victor Caruana Colombo) freed Mr Pulis and told him to “continue taking care of the children like an honest parent”.
I think that the media (if not the police) should take a deeper look at who was responsible for allowing these persons into contact with adoloscents. I believe that they had enough evidence to conclude that Pulis was sexually abusing them.
Also, Louise Vella, who testified in front of the Response Team, posted a comment on timesofmalta.com saying that the Response Team included Mario Grech, now the Bishop of Gozo.
Here it is:
“Ms Louise Vella
Today, 16:14
Eleven years ago I gave evidence at the curia against a priest child molester. Mgr (now Bishop) Mario Grech heard my testimony together with Dr Caruana Colombo. Bishop Grech served as a member of the Response Team. He must have witnessed at very close quarters the great pain inflicted on victims of clergy sexual abuse and their families. He must have heard loads of shameful evidence disclosed inside the holy grounds of the curia. Bishop Grech must also be aware these evil priests have contact with, and target, multiple victims. He should have realized by now that by knowingly allowing evil conduct to evade justice, the Catholic Church has been co-operating with evil. If Bishop Grech wants to set a good example, he should be doing his utmost to co-operate with the civil authorities and safeguard innocent victims from being harmed by these predators. He must come clean and immediately release the names of all local priests who have been credibly accused of child molestation. ”
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20110805/local/Convicted-priest-was-absolved-in-2003.378874
Just read parts of the judgement – stomach churning. How could the defence lawyer, who heard it all as it was spoken by the victims themselves, embrace and kiss Pulis when they lost the case?
It’s one thing to be of service as a defence lawyer, but to show such distorted emotions towards the perpetrator, she has got to be twisted herself.
Paedophiles, pedereasts or whatever you may want to call them, what they did was still despicable.
It just gets “better and better”: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20110805/local/Convicted-priest-was-absolved-in-2003.378874
Brilliant article, Daphne. I would never be able to synthesize complex problems for easy reading. You have.
If only we could ever hope to have a popular programmes like Xarabank transformed into a podium of experts on sexuality, and other subjects, with the premise of course that the public would stay put and listen.
Enormous harm is being done by misinformation; as I see it people don’t have or do not want to have time to read so they are just sitting ducks, gorging on canned condensed information.
It is children /adolescents themselves who will pay the price eventually. What you wrote is just the start of what could lead to serious debate, but I do appreciate that after all you are a columnist and this is a blog, and that can’t be done here.
As I said elsewhere, the aggressors are victims themselves, and so the vicious cycle goes on and on, only unbiased sane information can break that.
What is being unleashed is a witch-hunt and with all the prevailing prejudices emanating from ignorance, the homosexual community must be feeling the dire effects of the indirect fall-out. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to know that many young men and adolescents are now bolting their closet doors harder because of all this.
This entire affair is aggreviated by premeditated virulent attacks on the Catholic Church.
I am never scandalized by anything, because I have read too much to fail to understand human fragility, and if some are thinking that the case once over, would make an end to it, they are absolutely wrong.
There is a way, however, to minimise future harm, and that is information. We have to keep on asking why.
Five and six years, and this man faces life:
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20110805/world/sect-boss-guilty-of-child-sex-abuse.378897
Spot on. If these men weren’t so emotionally stunted by their internalized homophobia–and the Catholic Church didn’t offer itself as a haven outside of the law–this probably never would have happened.
The correct clinical term is ephebophilia – that is the attraction of older persons to adolescents (therefore past puberty or pubescent). We are here, therefore discussing (while being totally disgusted at) ephebophiles – not paedophiles, as you rightly point out.
How about we discuss (and condemn) people who force other people to do things against their will? Does it matter what philia it is? Or are we all medico-legal anoraks?
Baxxter, you are absolutely right. Soon we are going to have to call in the Greeks to help us understand what type of philia we are talking about here.
Daphne these are not called homosexuals but Hebephilia and Ephebophilia
Focus needs to shift from the priests, who essentially abused minors, to those who covered it up for 40 years.
Those who abused got away with it, over and over again. That in itself made the situation worse.
Those who abused are mentally unstable. Those who covered up are “sane”. It is not about dissolving the church but about justice, which no institution is (should be) above.