Wanting someone to understand our pain.
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I've been thinking about Dawn Eden's new book on the lives of the saints who were abused as children. I thought I'd try to find a few she may not have heard of and send their stories her way to consider for the book. I'm sure she would appreciate input from others who may know of saints who suffered sexual abuse as children. For instance, Melody, one of my readers reminded us of St. Germaine Cousin, whose childhood was filled with all sorts of abuse.
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What is difficult to know for sure however, is which saints may have endured some sort of sexual abuse or sexual violation as children, because before the mid to late 20th century, cases of abuse were rarely ever discussed or reported outside of the confessional. In fact, as the Oprah Show demonstrated, no one told anyone if they had been sexually abused - until Oprah had them on her show. Likewise, rapes were not always reported, frequently out of shame. God only knows what actually happened to the martyrs of the many social upheavals since the French Revolution, or the mass persecutions of Christians in pagan countries throughout Asia. Thousands were martyred - so how many were not only tortured but sexually violated?
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Secrets of the saints.
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In my research, I have yet to find a saint who had actually been raped and survived, and as for the martyrs of purity, none of the documents I have found say that the martyr was actually raped, although the victim was killed while resisting the attacker. In an early account of the life of Blessed Pierina Morosini, I seem to recall reading that the saint had been raped, although the fact seems to have been expunged in later biographies. (I may have been mistaken in my perception.)
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In the process of looking for these saints I've reflected on the very human need we all have to understand the bad things that happened to us in life, as well as the desire to have some one understand our pain. That said, our good fortune in finding a saint who went through the exact same terrible things we may have endured, seems to me to represent a sign of hope for us that good really can come from evil. That through the blood of Christ virginity is restored, sanctity triumphs over wickedness, and so on. Hence our desire to find saints just like ourselves. Maybe.
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Yet the question remains: Is there no saint who was actually raped and martyred? No saint who was sexually abused and survived? Does the Church hold virginity to such a lofty position that heroic virtue some how doesn't count if the victim was actually violated? Are we Christians like the Muslims who blame rape victims for the crime? No, I don't think so, despite the fact I am unable to find a saint who was sexually abused. To me it seems reasonable to conclude that most likely matters concerning sexual abuse and rape, if known, were not revealed or frankly discussed in a process out of a sense of justice, since the victims were not at fault. Likewise prudence and discretion may have been strictly observed for the sake of modesty. I'm only speculating of course, although it is more likely the victims themselves kept it secret. Outside of martyrdom, saints are made saints on the basis of their heroic virtue.
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Pious narcissism.
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For a variety of reasons, homosexual persons have long looked for a saint who was 'gay'. Gay activists speculate about many great souls, insisting they were gay. Their conclusions are based upon 19th and 20th century understanding of homosexual behavior and culture. The modern concept of homosexuality did not exist before the late 19th century. In this case, I think looking for 'gay' saints represents a kind of 'pious narcissism' - with the aim to canonize same sex attraction.
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I once asked a monk if he thought any of the saints had been gay, and he answered that he did not know of any. He went on to explain that the temptation to homosexual acts was likely to have afflicted some of the saints, but it wouldn't have been any different from other temptations to lust. Before the 20th century non-sexual same sex friendship would have known and preserved boundaries, especially as regards that sin they used to say was too awful even to name. We today can't even imagine that kind of discretion.
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Now days many people want to claim this or that saint was gay. Even very good Catholics do this. Not a few insist Blessed Cardinal Newman was gay because of his extraordinary friendship with Fr. Ambrose. Others speculate that the Carmelite Fr. Hermann Kohen was involved in intimate same sex relationships, yet there is absolutely no evidence for such a claim, especially as it is well known that before his conversion he had love affairs with women. Such speculation demonstrates the human desire to have saints be just like ourselves. There is nothing wrong with that, although in some cases it opens the door to validating immoral inclinations or acts, and leads to what I mentioned, a 'pious narcisissm'. Wishful thinking is nothing but a deception and a trap. But I digress.
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The penitents.
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Though we may not find actual evidence of virginity deflowered, I think we might assume certain saints may have been sexually abused as children by the direction their lives took later in life - especially as concerns penitents. For instance, before her conversion, St. Margaret of Cortona was the lover of a young nobleman, to whom she bore a son. It was only after discovering his murdered body that Margaret repented of her sinful lifestyle. She eventually became a great mystic of the Franciscan order.
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You may protest that victims of sexual abuse are not culpable for what happened to them and that unlike innocent victims, Margaret deliberately consented to a sinful lifestyle when she moved in with her Count. Yet today we know that some children, boys and girls, who had been abused end up being promiscuous later on - often in adolescence, others cohabit with a partner rather than getting married. My theory regarding Margaret of Cortona is based on that assumption. Hence the penitents, perhaps more numerous than the martyrs of purity, might well be considered part of the group of patrons for the sexually abused as well.
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We are all called to be saints.
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Having said that, all of the saints are powerful intercessors and models for the faithful for a variety of needs, thus it is good to look for those with whom we have some affinity and can identify with. Yet even the most pure and chaste, such as Therese of Lisieux knows and understands the suffering of souls, her sensitivity for the weakest amongst us surely makes her one of the greatest helps and models for survivors of all kinds of abuse. Of course, it is the Heart of Jesus who understands the suffering, wounded soul the best - he alone knows the most hidden recesses of our hearts and descends into depths of our misery to redeem us in his Blood.
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I think in our day and going forward, we will get to know of candidates for sainthood whose intimate lives are very well known. I'm sure we will be hearing of saints who were raped and died, or those who survived to become saints, as well as survivors of abuse. And undoubtedly, there will be saints who had been former sex workers, as well as former active homosexuals, who repented and abandon those lifestyles. Perhaps some of these will even be martyrs.
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Art: My special patron,
St. Peter Martyr. I chose him as a kid because he grew up with heretical parents and later died for the faith, writing the credo in his blood.
