A History of Loneliness
Save A Tree - Buy Used at Second Sale Books
By John Byrne
This is a fictional tackling of the hideousness that was the Catholic Church’s abuse horror in Ireland. The author does an excellent job at capturing how this awful hell developed, continued and was missed and ignored by so many for so long. In our times, with so much out in public and everything from what people eat to how they feel at any given moment being presented for public consumption and every personal idiosyncrasy, drama, tragedy, dysfunction, deviant behavior being discussed on TV and online, and so many horrible events flooding our reality every day, it is hard to imagine a time when there were things people just didn’t speak of and things so hideous no one could even imagine they could be happening even if someone whispered it to you. If a friend came up to you today and said an alien had come to him during the night and had taken him to a faraway planet and then returned him home, you’d nod and show concern for your friend’s mental stability. What these priests and Church hierarchy did was that foreign and completely unfathomable to the faithful Catholic at the time. We can’t even imagine such blind fealty to an organization. Suffice to say, this is the world all this was born and grew in. The protagonist is a non-offending young priest who, like many, was simply directed into the seminary by his mother. He did not question and made peace with his life. The story moves forward with sadness and tragedy just crashing down around him while he is utterly blind and oblivious. I found myself frequently thinking, “How the hell does he NOT see this?? What an idiot!!” But I had to really take myself back to his time and place. It is heavy, sad, depressing, but a good forensic examination of a terrible chapter in the Church’s history. It may be hard to believe, but it is worth reading. Contrary to the detrimental growing trend to avoid reading or learning about troubling historic events, I firmly believe we can only benefit by learning about and remembering history…the good, the bad and the ugly.
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