Broken Silence
by Victoria Cubberley
So enormously disappointed in human kind. Their choice to deny: live in fear, abandon the most innocent whose childlike eyes seek our refuge. In their helplessness, you chose to look away, turn your back on such screaming pain. A thousand years and still you chose to hurt. This history forever embraced, accepted, fear. Is there no one to stand tall with me free of attachments or agendas? Is there one, single, voice that can listen to my cries, my soft child cries? As I keep reaching, will I ever be touched by love? Must I keep standing here-alone, feeling only my own bravery? In this stillness of my loneliness. I am so angry at your cowardice, the ultimate betrayal in your distortion of my God-my God how you tried to take my very breath. There exists no greater sorrow-my life source, my existence, my harboring soul, than to use what held me together-My God!
I chose to stand tall.
I chose to not allow you, priest, to slowly and deliberately decimate me, God’s child.
I chose to embrace my rage at all of you.
I chose silence.
How could you not see, how could you not hear all the many cries of us, your children?
WHERE IS YOUR RAGE?
You chose, in your silence, to partner with evil.
I stood alone. Only God can touch my depth of pain. Love was all I craved on this lonely path. I simply need to be seen!
My deserved rage, hides my deep hurt. Words are futile. They carry no meaning, they just exist. Betrayal speaks in the pained dwelling of my silent scream.
Poem and writing absolutely beautiful and so true. I hope you get a lot of hits on this, so meaningful.
Victoria – I know your pain. I hear you!
http://Www.fromhurttohealing.wordpress.com
Victoria, your poem is absolutely beautiful and heart breaking. Please know there are so many of us who support you. If there was a way to heal your heart and soul, we would do it in a heartbeat. We are standing beside you in this terrible fight for justice. You are not alone.
GOD has reached you. !”..HE WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU OR FORSAKE YOU” YOU ARE HIS! ..despite this evil that HE has allowed to test our souls to END it, ( because it’s evil.) We must annihilate it NOW & Forever (in our church.) ITS OUR RESPONSIBILITY T O DO SO NOW with all that is within us! Each of US has our place to put our faith before HIM in a way that HE GIVES US.. . It is a known fact now…NO EXCUSES EXCEPTED! By HIM!
Thank you to everyone thus far that has replied to my poem. After 33 years of intense therapy, I am now ready to deal with my Father. This is the core! I will be doing very hard work. I left the most difficult for last. I have come such a long way. Therapy continues to be an extremely difficult walk into very painful places. The good news is when I finish dealing with my Father, I will be whole and with that I will begin my book. My hard work all these many years has proven to me that I have tremendous strength and unparalleled courage. I look back and don’t recognize who I was before therapy because I have grown to love who I was meant to be. I blog to Catholics 4 Change to reach out to the many survivors that read what is said especially by those of us who know what they are feeling. I also hope to educate those who are willing to understand as best they can and join with us seeking justice and the protection of the most innocent, our children. I am so humbled by my recovery. I have gained so much simply because I am worth it. I was able after many years to put the blame where it belonged, it was a huge step for me that gave me a sense of freedom I had not known. I hit bottom many times but each time I put one leg in front of the other even if I could only take one step forward. I know pain, I know shame, I know rage and I know injustice. My book will chronicle my story but will center on Hope. So thank you for the multiple times I have been supported by the caring and kind people who have now and in the past have demonstrated to me that I truly am not alone.
I am speechless. Sat here a good 15mins trying to figure out what to say. Vicky I am a better person for having met you. I believe love and hope conquer evil in the end even if it’s in the next life. God Bless you Vicky.
Thank You.
Vicky, you have produced a beautifully written poem which reaches into the depth of your heart ,soul and being. Having been friends with you for 30+ years, you have taught ME about perseverance. I applaud you, my dearest friend, for your continued strength and courage and will be the first in line at your book signing!!!!!
Beautiful and heart wrenching. This poem left me speechless. Thank you so much, Vicky, for writing it and sharing it. Best of luck in your endeavor.
Vicky,
Thank you for your beautifully written and deeply moving poem. I can fathom your feelings of hurt, betrayal, loss and suffering, and I am as crushed as you are by the people who do not acknowledge your hurt, who are not outraged by your victimization, who are not moved and inspired by your story of survival, and who respond to your heroic journey seemingly unmoved, unaffected, and silent.
I hope that, in writing your poem, it helped to unburden your mind, heart, and soul.
Thank you for making your poem public because unmoved and silent people need to hear it.
You are a truly remarkable person. I have deep respect and much appreciation for you and your work.
Kate
God Bless You Vicky. Those abusers will finally get their day in court on judgment day which has no statute of limitations.
Tom, I love your response, I just chuckled! You made my day, thank you.
Vicky, thank you.
Powerful!
Your word “silence” stands out in your poem and built around this silence I feel what use to be your intense inner suffering. In your own silence of sitting alone for hours, barely breathing and feeling violently tormented may have felt like a black hole draining life out of you. Then the catholic church was silent to your pain and suffering. The church’s failure to be concerned about your pain mocked you, its alienation mocked you, and its failure to love mocked you. The endless suffering the church did to you could of made you feel like a an outcast in life, a sacrificial victim, pathetic and rightly rejected by everyone. Vicky, Vicky, I am so deeply sorry for all this intense violent feelings and all the torment you have experienced from the catholic church.
Now, I appreciate you breaking this silence by planting seeds of your own interiority, your own feelings and your own identity. I appreciate you taking this silence into hope and giving it a background into hope. I appreciate you observing your experience of silence, with all the mental activity of defining and dividing, learning to rest in the confidence of hope. I appreciate your dynamic faith in your silence to allow everything to have this unfolding process for you. I appreciate you standing up to all the pressure to be silent when the church was intimidating you, making no apologies, and strong-arming you as if that will get them their way. I appreciate you learning your own special value as a person
In a profound, direct way, hope is God within you and just this one enormous dance you offer us all. You are truly a star of Hope.
This past weekend I had an amazing spiritual experience. Its hard to explain exactly what happened but I felt my heart physically and spiritually transfigured and the crazy or amazing thing about it is that a complete stranger came over to me that had been watching me in prayer and she said I know this is crazy but something about you reminds me of Our Lady I don’t know quite know what it is. and I started sobbing as I was standing next to two of my friends. The thing is everything clicked for me earlier and I was reminded that everything is about searching for Gods will and I also was overwhelmed by love for Jesus. I am fully aware of my imperfections but I felt this was validation of the experience I had just gone thru. I have been thinking about good and evil alot lately and about grace. As I was reading this poem by Vicky again last night I was thinking how so much grace was poured out when Vicky went and talked at Our Lady of Grace church. I could feel the evil spirits fleeing in defeat … and grace flowing like light shining in from an open door.God was with you Vicky and it was amazing. I have learned over the years that the best way to heal is to feel grief not run from it but we were never meant to go thru it alone we need each other and that God is with us if we search for him wholeheartedly but many times that means being vulnerable and accepting our brokenness first. You reminded me of this again thru your poem Vicky and it left me humbled because you shared both your strength and your brokenness. Vicky I am very proud to call you a friend know that many here love you.
Beth when I think of Vicky ,the two words that come to mind are grace and wisdom. I met Vicky for the first time a few years ago at a vigil outside of 222..while the inhabitants of 222 walk by the victims/survivors as if they are not even standing there,and there was Vicky standing strong in the face of anything that would come her way..all for the sake of victims and children. I don’t know if the word untouchable is the correct word but that it is what comes to mind..that nothing they could do could sway her from her mission.
If I had a magic wand I would make Vicky in charge of the protection of the children in the archdiocese and they would finally,finally have a strong voice for them..Vicky would be the best advocate for children that this town would ever see.
I was driving on Woodbine Rd yesterday and on one side of the street the kids from the school out on the fields playing sports and on the other side the facility where perverts from around the country are shipped out of their Diocese and shipped into ours..the visual almost too much. We need Vicky at 222 but she wouldn’t last a minute because she is all about the truth and respect of children . Vicky energizes me to use my voice for kids because when an archdiocese thinks there is anything normal about shipping in the trash from other Diocese and putting them near kids it shows the mentality that still exists..a dangerous one that does not respect children but favors depraved men. I had some interesting feedback on what it is like for kids to be across from the facility..maddening..their eyes should never even be upon those children. Vicky you are my inspiration and thank you for all you have shared with me over the years and their is entire generation of kids informed because of people like you.
Like this creep
http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/catholic-priest-gets-prison-time-for-child-porn-possession-1.1065615
Let’s bring them here and put them next to kids for offenses that they will end up on Megans Law..brilliant child protection plan..just awesome..ship them in from other places as if we don’t have enough problems to begin with..was this creep strolling around the area? What were his restrictions? hmmm….
Vicky I didn’t mean to hijack your post but you know when I get fired up about protecting kids!
Where is your RAGE?… I read this & I say..” It is there. It rages at the “look the other way crowd” And I ask GOD PLEASE DO SOMETHING…and HE DOES & the people are still blind. I see articles about “Silence means CONSENT” & I think ” now they’ re getting it..and they Don’t…What to do?
Keep loving your neighbor as yourself, pray and keep JESUS CLOSE..Make sure that all children know there are wolves in sheep’s clothing. BE CAREFUL ..your body belongs only to you , no matter whatever a good person may tell you.. You & OUR GOD WITHIN YOU. SAYS NO,NO MATTER WHAT…YOU RUN TO THE POLICE! Please give me & humanity more answers to combat this blasphemy put on our Blessed children.Thank you all! Gloria
A brilliant and touching poem!