Dear Francis

Dear Pope Francis: ‘A year after John Paul II came, I was raped by a priest’   

We invite a range of people to write the Pope an open letter in advance of his Irish visit

Irish Times, 

Dear Francis,

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Dear Francis,

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Francis

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Dear Francis,

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Dear Pope Francis,

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Dear Francis,

I don't recognise your spiritual authority. I have sat across tables and held the hands of tearful women who do recognise your power. Your words mean a lot to them.

Those women told me about having their hair chopped off with shears, about being degraded every day; told, “You're here because nobody wants you”, having their children stolen from them and trafficked to rich Americans.

The violence and abuse perpetrated by your church in this country are still largely unknown.

It's buried, and we don't know what's buried here.

We didn't know there were 796 babies buried in Tuam.

The impact of violence, forced adoptions, mass unmarked graves, forced illegal labour and State-sponsored secrecy and lies left a population suffering from post-traumatic stress for me to be born into. I have met the legacy of that trauma every day, on my grandmother's face. In the words of my aunts. In the touch of my mother.

The legacy of the trauma is in the choice every young Irish man makes to buy a rope and take his own life, it's in every act of sexual violence perpetrated in this country. It affects every interaction I have with the State, and it has ripped from me the right to a spiritual life. It has taken God from me, and so many others of my generation, who have filled the hole left with addiction.

If you were a corporate company, responsible for a chemical leak, what would be the Christian thing to do? Trauma can be invisible.

I'm asking you to do two things: pay for counselling to be made freely available in Ireland. Match our hospitality in paying €8 million for your visit and help us to stop digging to find out what's buried here.

Because you know. Tell us. Release the records you hold, be honest with us, ask for our forgiveness. The longer it's buried, the worse it will get.

At the very least, your words mean a lot to the women I have met.

Tell them, “I believe you”.

Yours,

Grace Dyas