When we talk about the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse scandal, it’s easy to think of the victims as fitting a certain profile or just being a number. We don’t always hear their individual stories or think about them as individuals.
Now, in a very compelling video for BuzzFeed, two of those victims — one man and one woman — share what happened to them. They talk about how the priests gained their trust before taking advantage of them.
Imagine these stories multiplied thousands of times over.
Think about how many thousands of priests were involved in these scandals worldwide.
Consider how many Church leaders knew about this abuse and covered it up.
Realize how much money has already been spent by the Church in settlements — $119,029,647 by one estimate in just one calendar year — and how many more cases have yet to be realized because the victims have remained silent all these years.
Only then do you get a sense of just how extensive and awful this problem was for decades.