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Film: Deliver Us From Evil
By admin | July 27, 2007
At some point in the last month or so I found out about Deliver Us From Evil and popped it my blockbuster que. The film is a documentary related to the sexual abuse scandal involving priest Oliver O’Grady of a diocese in California and the accused cover up of the now Cardinal of the LA Diocese and the film even goes so far as to implicitly accuse the current pope of cover up during his nearly 30 year tenure overseeing a committee that dealt with such offenses.
There have been 100,000 people come forward in the US alone about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church and the estimate is that 80% of those abused never come forward. And in my mind this isn’t just an issue for the Catholic Church as was recently displayed in the media related to protestant abuses.
Every few minutes a new low is reached and my jaw was continually on the ground. Father Ollie, as they called him, has so many victims that he can’t even track them all. At one point he said he spent as much time planning and executing abuse as he did in his ministerial duties, and he was a priest for 30 years. In fact this sick, demented man raped children as young as 9 months old. I heard that before Carrie and Chloe got home and then as I sat with Chloe later I wondered how someone could do such a perverse thing.
I must admit I have not checked out all the details. But there are certain pieces are are irrefutable, including O’Grady’s abuse because he openly acknowledges it, even if he never one time admits to it as evil or sin. But there was certainly cover up as O’Grady was shipped around to different parishes after getting caught in a community. At some point the Bishop could have put an end to his abusive patterns and yet did nothing. (O how anyone who claims communication between between a bishop and priest privileged, so as to hide the sexual abuse of children, needs to be popped in the mouth!)
Should you watch this film? I don’t know. It’s not graphic, there isn’t much language except for a few outburst by victims recounting their ordeal (and who could blame them for referring to this guy as an a-hole, bastard, and throwing in a few F-bombs). But certainly this should open up anyone’s eyes to the gravity of such sin in the church. As one lady said, it doesn’t matter what religious or non-religious beliefs you hold, it should be our priority to protect our children.
I think the film was important for me in two regards. First the first-hand perspective of abuse was powerful. When one lady describes that every time she sees a Dodge Duster (his car then) drive by she has to pull over to dry heave, you can see how traumatic this was beyond the physical pain caused. Putting ourselves in the shoes of the victims is what helps us to understand.
As I watched the film I was drawn to thought about the lengths to which our churches (LifeConnection) need go to protect our children. This all is why background checks and the like are so utterly important for churches. If you are a part of a church that doesn’t have a system in place to protect children not only are they in jeopardy of liability legally but worse than that, they are putting are putting our most vulnerable danger. These are simple checks, they are relatively cheap (aren’t children worth $25 for the check - yeah that’s guilt laden but if you’re not checking you need this kind of check). These are not fool proof but it’s the starting point (they’re not sufficient but are necessary). From there our churches need to have systems in place for multiple workers with kids, no one is alone with a child in the rest room, no one is alone with children at all.
The film was hauntingly horrific. It was well done and quite moving.
