Soul Killers!
"Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil;
that put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!"
(Isa. 5:20.)
“The greatest way to love another person is to pray for them.”
Father Frank Meccia, MM
Except for the murderous Castro brothers, whom I have hated since the early ‘60s; Notre Dame football, because a (hopefully) well-intentioned Sister punished me – in fifth grade – when I would not pray for an “Irish” victory over the Miami Hurricanes (who had more Irish and more Catholics on the ‘Canes team than that school in Indiana); and the military dictatorship of Chile, I never really hated anyone.
Not until the early ‘80s when, as a part of my doctoral studies, I was training on the adolescent psychiatric unit of a Miami hospital and observed first-hand and up-close as a self-absorbed father destroyed the soul of a genuinely good young teen who only wanted to be seen and loved.
The laws of “social distance” and “only during office hours,” the idea of being a “blank slate” to therapy clients and the “45-or-50-minute therapeutic hour” – all the stuff we’re taught in our graduate training – go out the window when you’re a priest-counselor or counselor-priest. They don’t teach would-be counselors and would-be psychologists to pray and pray constantly for their clients. Father Roger and I pray – and pray constantly – for the children, men and women whom we serve. That is a part of who we are and what we do
So, weeks after his discharge from the hospital, when the “Come quick! Please come!” call woke me at three-something in the morning, I went. Andy’s mother met me at the front door but, from the street, I could hear him shouting “Look at me! Just look at me! Hear me! Look at me!” Andy stood at the door to his parents’ bedroom, desperately pleading to be seen. To be recognized as his father’s son. To be recognized as the child of God he was.
“Just look at me! Just see me!” His voice was cracking, vocal cords failing. His body shook – with rage, with desperation, on the edge collapsing.
From behind, I put my hand on his shoulder. This really-big-for-his-age kid who towered over me turned, recognized, collapsed into my arms and sobbed uncontrollably on my shoulder.
Forty years later, I can still visualize his father – his back propped-up against the bed board as he thumbed, nonchalantly, through Aviation Weekly. Immune to his son’s voice and tears. Immune to his son.
And, in that moment I hated him.
I still hate him.
Because, even as I watched that self-absorbed airline pilot kill – murder – the soul of his son, whom he eventually sent out-of-state and out of his sight and life, I prayed for Andy. I prayed for him because I loved him. I still pray for him.
Twenty-plus years later…
The inevitable call…
Not “Come quick!”
Not “Come quick!”
Quiet. Soft. Mournful.
Andy’s mother announcing “He’s died.”
From the alcoholism that developed over thirty years as he sought desperately to fill the void where his soul once dwelt.
I pray for Andy and I console myself with the echo of the Christ in whom I believe – “Come blessed of my Father, enter the Kingdom prepared for you….”
The French-Catholic writer Francois Mauriac was especially captured by the writing of “the conscience of humanity” – Elie Wiesel, the 1986 Nobel Peace Prize laureate. The man who survived Auschwitz and Buchenwald gave testimony to the horrors of the Holocaust that were beyond vocabulary.
“Never shall I forget those moments
which murdered my God and my soul
and turned my dreams to dust.
Never shall I forget these things, even
if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself.
Never.”
Time and again, Wiesel described the death of souls.
Souls.
Not just bodies.
Souls die in this rarified atmosphere of Earth.
Souls die.
Priests, bishops, cardinals of my Church have killed the souls of children and teens, of adult men and women through sexual abuse and their silence about the abuse - their “the Church’s reputation-saving” acquiescent silence. There is no denying. The abuse and the abusers and their complicit allies have been and are the soul-killers of too many. Their only hope is that God will be more merciful to them than many of us believe they deserve.
But soul-killing lives beyond the boundaries of the sanctuary and bishops’ offices, beyond the frescoed ceiling of Vatican offices.
*****
Even as I write this, I celebrate every element of that evening. A mini-summit. Jimmy, long in recovery from his horrific crack addiction; Ted, a distinguished academic and internal medicine physician; and Tim, struggled with a recurring depression that provoked intermittent cocaine binges. Not an intervention. Four guys scarfing down sushi, joking. Just being four guys.
As the evening wore down, Tim spoke. Quietly. Eyes shining. Not flashing. Shining.
“Thanks. Thanks for a night with friends and just being myself.”
Weeks later, during a counseling session, Tim went suddenly silent.
Silent. An aching silence.
Followed by body wrenching sobs and the chocking words “I hate being gay” and “But I am.”
Three or four years later, late at night and while wrapping Christmas gifts, this bright, energetic, blue-eyed and blond-haired young man who could have been the envy of almost any young athlete, died of a heart attack reportedly provoked by the HIV medications he was taking.
More than twenty years later, I pray for Tim. And…
I hate.
I hate those who flooded him with such grief, who seared him with such pain that he sobbed for his own being.
Soul killers.
Perhaps my Christ, who – I am certain – welcomed and embraced Tim with the words “Come, blessed of my Father. Enter the Kingdom prepared for you” - will have greater mercy on them for the wounds they inflicted on Tim than I can.
*****
Built like a professional hockey player – six feet of solid muscle but with about seven percent body fat and a twelve pack of abs, Eddie captained his high school football team, while serving as student government president; headed his college fraternity; and graduated from college with honors before entering the military. In the service of our country, he completed three tours as an officer disarming improvised explosive device in Iraq and Afghanistan and…
Praying each day and with each bomb that one might explode and kill – destroy – him before anyone would ever know that he is gay.
He began counseling hoping to gain control of his binge drinking. As our third session ended, I begged pardon “for turning my back" and attempted to schedule our next session on the computer.
Then a whisper.
“Pardon?”
A whisper.
“Pardon?”
“You don’t want to see me again.”
I turned. “What?!”
“You’re a priest and I’m gay. You don’t want to see me again.”
And the tears.
An American hero sobbed…
Because, for the first time in his life, the cause of his desire to be destroyed by an improvised explosive device hidden in a trash pile half a world away had been spoken.
Therapists aren’t supposed to hug their clients. It’s a basic principle of counseling.
It’s crap.
I hugged.
We hugged.
And sobbed. Body wracking sobs.
And I prayed… For this brilliant, gentle-giant American hero.
I continue to pray for him. Quietly. Privately. In the first “Lord, have mercy” of each Mass.
And I hate those who would make this great young man pray to be destroyed by an IED on the other side of the world.
Soul killers.
*****
In 2021, 48,183 Americans died by suicide – about one every eleven minutes. In the same year an estimated 12.3 million American adults seriously thought about suicide, 3.5 million planned an attempt and 1.7 million attempted suicide, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Among young people, those who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual have a higher prevalence of suicidal thoughts and behaviors than their heterosexual peers.
In 2020 suicide and nonfatal self-harm cost the nation over half-a-trillion dollars in medical costs. Over $500,000,000!
The Trevor Project’s 2022 National Survey of LGBT Youth Mental Health found a three-year long uptick in the rates of suicidal thoughts among LGBTQ young people. The study found that 45% of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year and fourteen percent – one-in-seven – attempted suicide. Those with high rates of support from their family reported attempting suicide at less than half the rate of those who felt low or moderate social support. The study also found that LGBTQ youth who found their school to be affirming and supportive reported lower rates of attempting suicide, but fewer than one-in-three transgender and nonbinary youth found their home to be gender affirming.
Nonetheless – and terrifyingly, 60% of LGBTQ young people who wanted mental health care in the preceding year were not able to get it.
The study is a radical challenge to those who preach a gospel of “pro-life but anti-LGBTQ” – soul killers. Among LGBTQ youth 13- to 17-years old, 50 percent – half – had considered suicide in the previous year and 18-percent – almost one-in-five - actually attempted suicide. The statistics are only slightly better for those 18-to-24: 37% considered and 8% - one-in-twelve – attempted suicide. Twelve percent of white LGBTQ youth attempted suicide in the previous year, compared to 21% of Native American/Indigenous youth; 20% of Middle Eastern/North African and 19% of Black youth; 16% of Latino youth; 17% of Multiracial youth; and 12% of Asian American Pacific Islander youth.
The same report showed that 73% of LGBTQ youth reported experiencing symptoms of anxiety and 58% reported experiencing symptoms of depression. The percentages were higher for transgender and nonbinary youth.
*****
With the possible exception of attendance, baptisms and collection increases and decreases, pastors and theologians, bishops and “religious leaders” rarely think in terms of statistics.
The Trevor Project report makes one thing clear: It is theologically and morally impossible to be anti-LGBTQ - to discriminate against these children of God - and be “pro-life.”
It is impossible to be “pro-life” and a killer of souls.
I hate those “religious leaders” and politicians who preach, speak and legislate prejudice and hatred and I pray that God will be more merciful to these soul-killers than I can.
“Never shall I forget those moments
which murdered my God and my soul
and turned my dreams to dust.
Never shall I forget these things, even
if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself.
Never.”