There was nothing in my life that prepared me for the horror that was to unfold in Bergen Catholic High School in the following two years. We had no knowledge of the psychology of oppression or the idea of child abuse, or even heard the word "pedophile." To us, they represented the direct intervention of the Church and God himself. We had universally been taught that teachers, and especially, priests, nuns and brothers were to be held in high esteem and could do no wrong. Up until that point in time I had only had women as teachers and suddenly the teachers were all men.Īs teenagers in the mid sixties, we were very naive, not having been exposed to much beyond the confines of the Catholic schools that most of us had attended before coming to Bergen Catholic. It was intimidating at first meeting the teachers, Brothers and lay men, who taught at the school. I was assigned to Room 34 as my homeroom, in what was then the new extension to the original school building. It was my first exposure to an all male environment and my first dealings with Brothers. The first days in Bergen Catholic were disorienting. Unbeknownst to me then, my experiences with the nuns were nothing in comparison to what was to come at the hands of the Irish Christian Brothers in Bergen Catholic High School the following two years. I graduated from the grasp of the Sisters of Charity from Our Lady of the Visitation Church School in Paramus, New Jersey in 1963. The image of a stern nun in full habit, bearing down on you with ruler in hand is the stuff of nightmares. Many of us kids were humiliated and intimidated by the nuns on an ongoing basis. The experiences with the nuns during those years were traumatic. I had mixed feelings about this, having just spent eight years under the tutelage of Dominican nuns and the Sisters of Charity. I remember taking a long test for placement in the school in the gymnasium and I recall receiving the acceptance form. I did not want to go to Bergen but my domineering father whose self-interests for me showed no concern whatsoever for mine, or anyone else's, feelings forced me into the school. I was 14 years old and had just entered Bergen Catholic High School in Oradell, New Jersey. "People don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed."įriedrich Nietzsche Serial Sexual Harassment, Assault & Battery by Irish Christian BrothersĪt Bergen Catholic High School, Oradell, New Jersey: A memoir from 1964 Written on: January 20, 2002 THE EXECUTION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT by Kobutsu Malone
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