11 Places to Listen to Survivors’ Voices Online
With everything going on in my city and my country right now, it feels strange to talk about anything else today. However, In Spirit and Truth has a specific focus - the issue of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church - and that topic remains important, whatever else is happening in the world.
So, I am going to go ahead with the post I had planned for today, but please know this does not mean I am not paying attention to other issues of injustice. For now, I just ask all of you to pray and stand up for justice as you feel called. Let’s all make an effort to listen to the voices speaking truth we need to hear.
In my long, slow journey to understand the full reality of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, I have learned how important it is to listen to the voices of survivors, those who have experienced this abuse firsthand. At the beginning, much of that listening took place through news stories, where survivors were interviewed about their experiences. These sources were incredibly valuable in opening up my eyes to the horror of sexual abuse and to the diverse perspectives of those who experience this trauma; I continue to read survivors’ narratives whenever they are covered in the news.
Today, I am honored to have friendships with many survivors and to be able to learn from them firsthand. I also gain a lot of perspective from reading a variety of written accounts online, and I now follow several blogs and Facebook pages written by survivors themselves. Unlike an interview or news story, a personal blog or Facebook page gives a survivor the opportunity to choose how to tell their story - and to continue the conversation beyond a single point in time. These sites give me an opportunity to listen to survivors' voices in a more direct and holistic way.
If you appreciate reading In Spirit and Truth, you may want to consider following some of these blogs and Facebook pages authored by survivors of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.
Note: These sources represent a diversity of experiences and perspectives. I am recommending them not because I agree with everything written, but because I value listening to and learning from a variety of voices. I considered writing a description of each blog, but I think it’s better to let you check them out yourself, without my commentary shaping your experience.
Blogs
(I am linking to one recent blog post for each blog, to give you a sense of what you might find as a reader, but please click around a bit to learn more.)
(These survivors don’t have blogs but share content from a survivors’ perspective.)
I hope you will consider following a few of these blogs and Facebook pages to hear these important voices.
I would love to know if you have others to add to this list!
Come Holy Spirit, open our ears and our hearts.