The following column, written by journalist and fellow Survivor Amanda Beam, was featured on July 17, 2012 in the online edition of the News & Tribune from Jeffersonville, Indiana and is reprinted with the author’s permission. Amanda’s column can be found every Tuesday at www.newsandtribune.com. I’ve always said everyone has a story. Most often, you just have to ask the right questions to discover it. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to tell the tale on your own accord without those inquiries being solicited. In the news recently, two stories have come to light that certain cowards wanted to keep hidden in the shadows. People decided to ask questions too late. One is the Penn State scandal involving former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky. The other is about a California man named William Lynch. On May 10, 2010, Lynch walked into a Los Gatos retirement home and allegedly beat 65-year-old retired Catholic priest Jerold Lindner. But Lindner wasn’t any ordinary priest. Through the years, more than a dozen people, including members of his own family, have accused Lindner of child molestation. Thirty-seven years ago, Lynch maintains he and his brother were victimized. According to the now 44-year-old Lynch, the priest violently sodomized he and his brother at a church summer camp. He also claims Lindner forced the boys to perform explicit sexual acts on one another. They were 7 and 4 years old. By the time Lynch confessed the purported atrocities to law enforcement more than two decades later, the statute of limitations had expired. Lindner remained free and never would serve any jail time. Lynch’s story is unfortunately not unique. A 2009 Clinical Psychology Review study estimated 19.7 percent of females and 7.9 percent males worldwide have suffered from child sexual abuse. Many researchers believe the prevalence is actually much higher. Due to the social stigma, fear and shame of the abuse, a high proportion of children and adults never report the crimes. Whether if anyone ever questioned these relationships, or if the children’s pleas and assertions were ignored, we’ll never know. Many of the stories remain untold. But somehow, even in silence, the poison bubbles to the surface and permeates the lives of the survivors. You feel hate. You feel despair. And, at times, you want to destroy the person who made you feel so worthless and ashamed. Lynch felt that anger and acted on it. I never got the chance. More than a decade ago, the man who molested me for four years as a child died. It began when I was a preschooler and continued until I believe third grade. I say believe because I really don’t know. I can remember at least 30 different times. It...
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