sometimes it's wild watching 2 people you used to know from within the same group of online friends get radicalized in 2 wildly different directions

One of the first articles that mentioned Moon’s pikareum sex rituals

A.D. magazine   May 1974   by Jane Day Mook   (pages 30-36)

New Growth on Burnt-Over Ground

Third in an A.D. series offering a critical look at new religions in America.

Hope and fear are almost always entwined in the impulses that cause a man or woman to seek a faith. Therefore it is not strange that religions contain promises both of divine intervention or mercy, and of judgment. Thus, Judaism speaks of a messiah and an apocalypse, the faithful of Islam expect a delivering mahdi and a terrible, bright-sworded angel, and some Christian Scriptures indicate that Christ will summon saints to glory and the wicked to perdition on a future Day of the Lord. Even among the new religions now sprouting on the burnt-over earth of American religious life, the notes of hopeful expectation and dread of doom are sounded. Religious leaders arise, and are examined by their followers: Are you he (or she) who will deliver us? And almost always a direct answer is avoided in replies that sound strangely like, “Who do men say that I am?”  Today, in many areas of America, people are asking a middle-aged Korean named Sun Myung Moon who he is. Writer Jane Day Mook, in six months of extensive research, has come up with some of the answers.

The Unification Church

There has been a rash of headlines:

Korean Preacher Urges U.S. Not to “Destroy President” Minneapolis Star, December 1, 1973

Watergate Day of Prayer Asked by Unification Church Washington Post, December 18, 1973

Unification Church Program Under Way in Houston Religious News Service, December 27, 1973

There have been other media reports:

█ On December 26, 1973, Congressman Guy Vander Jagt of Michigan read into the Congressional Record a statement by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon of Korea, founder of the Unification Church International, urging Americans to forgive, love, unite.

█ Governor Wendell Anderson of Minnesota and Mayors Charles Stenvig and Larry Cohen of Minneapolis and St. Paul, respectively, issued proclamations saluting Moon when he visited the Twin Cities in December last year.

█ Twelve hundred supporters of Moon turned out—with specially issued tickets (100 of them for the best seats up front) — to cheer President Nixon at the national Christmas tree lighting ceremony at the White House on December 13, 1973. They carried signs saying, “God loves Nixon,” “Support the President,” and quite simply, “God.” Afterward, when the President came to greet them in Lafayette Park, one writer reports, they knelt down as he drew near.

█ Six weeks later Moon was invited to the 22nd annual National Prayer Breakfast in the Washington Hilton Hotel. While it was going on, more than 1,000 of Moon’s followers gathered to sing patriotic songs and demonstrate their support of the President. Tricia Nixon Cox and her husband walked among the disciples and spoke with Neil Salonen, national head of the Unification Church.

█ The next day, Moon had an unscheduled meeting with President Nixon. He embraced the President and then, it is reported, “prayed fervently in his native tongue while the President listened in silence.” Before leaving, Moon exhorted the President not to knuckle under to pressure but to stand up for his convictions.

What is this all about? Who is this Korean religious leader, Sun Myung Moon, who reaches the eye of those in high office, including the President himself?

What is this Unification Church that has suddenly surfaced in the United States with so much noise and splash? Is it really a Christian church? Is its aim political or religious, or both?

The Unification Church (whose full name is The Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity) found its way into the consciousness of a few Americans about 15 months ago. In Tarrytown, New York, a gracious estate of 22 acres overlooking the Hudson River quietly changed hands for $850,000. [Price confirmed by Michael Mickler in History of the UC in the US.] “Belvedere” became a center for the Unification Church.

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Korean messiah? Christ of the second advent? Young Americans find new faith and new life in following him.

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Joyous, disciplined, loving, Moon’s young followers express the confidence of the deeply committed.

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Suddenly the residents of Tarrytown discovered that, because this is a “church” and therefore tax exempt, they had lost $8,000 in city taxes. They discovered, too, that by the summer of 1973 the estate was teeming with young people—Japanese, Korean, German, Austrian, and especially British.

The British—115 of them—came in response to ads posted on their college bulletin boards: New York and back for $25 and a summer of “leadership training” to boot. But the Belvedere mansion was not adequate. Crowding was dismal, regulations and restrictions irksome, morale bad, the program unfocused, the unabashed conversion tactics unpalatable. A good many of the students apparently went home to England disappointed and angry.

Meanwhile, the Unification Church had purchased a home for their leader, Sun Myung Moon, who has acquired permanent residency visas in the United States for himself and his family. Reported purchase price of the second estate was $620,000 with an additional $50,000 said to have been spent for furnishings.

By summer’s end attention shifted to New York City and the start of Moon’s 21-city Day of Hope Tour. Full-page ads appeared in the local papers:

CHRISTIANITY IN CRISIS NEW HOPE

Rev. Sun Myung Moon

The ads carried, center-page, a picture of a pleasant-faced Korean man, sometimes in Korean dress, sometimes in Western, sometimes posed with the capitol dome in the background. They told of coming meetings in Carnegie Hall. The same pictures and message were in subways, drug stores, shop windows. They were on leaflets handed out by dozens of earnest young men and women, some American, some from abroad.

Invitations went out to city leaders, especially clergy: “Rev. and Mrs. Sun Myung Moon request the honor of your presence” at a dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. ...

Mayor John Lindsay and Senator Jacob Javits sent messages of regret, but approximately 250 others came. Catholic and Protestant clergy, armed services chaplains, foundation executives, university professors. Solid names all.

The pattern was to be repeated across the country as the much publicized Day of Hope Tour moved south and west through the last three months of last year, and again in the second tour of 33 cities that began in mid-February.

I went with my husband to the first presentation by Mr. Moon at Carnegie Hall on October 1. Outside, a few protesters milled about (Jehovah’s Witnesses mostly). Inside, the lobby was full of young people, most of them Oriental. “Welcome Mother. Welcome Father,” said a charming Korean girl taking our tickets as guards looked through our briefcases. “Welcome to our program. Thank you for coming, Mother. Enjoy it please.”

Mr. Moon was already sitting on stage. He was wearing Western dress, as was his translator, Lieutenant Colonel Pak Bo Hi, formerly a military attache stationed in Washington.

Moon spoke in Korean, flailing the air and pounding the lectern. It was not easy to follow his message, which was about Adam, Eve, Satan, and the Holy Spirit, linked in a mysterious theology we could not piece together.

Who is this man Moon, and what was the message he wanted us to hear?

Sun Myung Moon was born in what is now North Korea in the village of Kwangju Sangsa Ri [in North P'yŏngan province] on January 6, 1920. His parents were Christians, members of the Presbyterian Church, which is the largest Protestant denomination in Korea. After attending village primary school Moon was sent to high school in the southern city of Seoul.

On Easter Sunday 1936, when he was 16, Moon had a vision. As he prayed on a mountainside, he relates, Jesus himself appeared and told him “to carry out my unfinished task.” Then a voice from heaven said, “You will be the completer of man’s salvation by being the second coming of Christ.”

The local ground was ready for such ideas. Already there were among some Pentecostal Christians in the underground church in Pyongyang predictions of a new messiah who would be a Korean. As Moon went about his engineering studies at [a Technical High School affiliated with] Waseda University in Tokyo, he pondered, remembering his vision. In 1944 he returned to North Korea and set about to develop among these Pentecostals a following of his own. In 1946 he founded the “Broad Sea Church.” His followers, it is said, were fanatical people.

Meanwhile, in South Korea a man named Kim Paik-Moon [or Kim Baek-moon], knowing the prophecy of a Korean messiah, had already taken the obvious next step. Kim considered himself a savior and said so. In Paju, north of Seoul, he had established a community called “Israel Soodo Won” (Israel Monastery), and Moon spent six months there learning what was to become the basis of his own theology, the “Divine Principle,” before returning to Pyongyang.

It was about this time that he changed his original name of Yong Myung Moon to Sun Myung Moon. To many people “Yong” means dragon. “Myung” means shining, and Moon and Sun are understood as in English. Therefore, since 1946 his name has meant Shining Sun and Moon. It savors of divinity and of the whole universe. A name is essential to an Oriental, as revealing one’s character.

Now the facts become uncertain. Between 1946 and 1950 Sun Myung Moon spent time in prison in North Korea. The reason? His anti-Communist activities, Moon testifies, reminding us of the rabid Communism of North Korea. Bigamy and adultery, others claim, noting that his real anti-Communist campaign did not take shape until 1962.

In any case, late in 1950 Moon was released and he trekked to South Korea as a refugee with two or three [it was two] disciples. Settling in Busan, he began to propagate his principles. In 1954 he founded his new church [in Seoul], calling it “The Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity.”

Moon had gleaned his theological ideas from Kim [Baek-moon], and a follower, Yoo Hyo-won [Eu Hyo-won], wrote them down. By 1957 Divine Principle, which proclaims the theology of the Unification Church, was in print. It was first published in English in this country in 1966 and for a second time in 1973.

Divine Principle is concerned with the physical as well as the spiritual salvation of humankind, and the doctrine goes like this:

God intended that Adam and Eve should be perfect and that therefore their children also would be perfect. But Satan entered the Garden of Eden and seduced Eve. By this act she became impure, her blood forever tainted. This taint she passed on to Adam, through their union, and so he too—and their children and all humankind—became forever impure.

God wanted to redeem humanity from this impurity. Therefore, he sent to earth Jesus, the second Adam, and Jesus began the work of redemption. Spiritual salvation he achieved. But God’s will was once again thwarted by Satan. Jesus died on the cross before he could marry and father children. Thus, physical redemption was not accomplished. Our blood is still impure. Now it is time for the third Adam or “the Christ of the second advent.” It is time for the physical redemption of humanity and the reign of the New Israel, Korea.

How will all this come about? Quite simply: the third Adam sent by God to earth—to Korea—will marry a perfect woman, and their children will be the first of a new and perfect world. Eden will return to earth. Heaven will be here, not in some shadowy afterlife.

Does Moon consider himself the new messiah? In the early days of the movement, he admitted that he did. He no longer does so, and his followers are apt to smile when asked what they believe and say, “It is a personal matter.” In the national headquarters of the Unification Church in Washington, however, a votive candle burns beneath a portrait of Moon. Furthermore, in some materials of the Unification Church in Korea there are mythical tales relating that Moon was worshiped by Jesus. Jesus asked Moon to help him complete the saving of humankind and supposedly said, “I have done half, but you can do the other half.”

The half assigned to Moon, of course, involves his fourth and present wife. In the early 1940s Moon was married, but in 1954 this first wife left him because, he said, “she did not understand my mission.” He also is said to have had two other wives before marrying in 1960 an 18-year-old [she was 17] high school graduate named Hak Ja Han. At the time of their union (which is called “the Marriage of the Lamb”), he told his followers that she had not yet achieved his own spiritual perfection, but he was confident that she would in time. Together they are the new Adam and the new Eve, the parents of the universe, and their children herald the coming perfection of humanity.

Here reference must be made to “pikareum,” or “blood separation,” which is referred to in Japanese and Korean sources. In this secret initiation rite, it is said that the inner-core members must have intercourse. In the early days of the Unification Church, this was with Moon who, through the act, made pure the initiate.

In 1955 in Seoul Moon was imprisoned briefly and several students and professors were expelled from their universities because of engaging in what were called “the scandalous rites of the Unification Church.” However, in the 14 years since Moon’s marriage to Hak Ja Han, it is not known whether in the secrecy of the initiation ceremony, the rite has become purely a symbolic one.

When asked about this matter of purification, a leader of the Unification Church in the United States replied that purification takes place at the marriage ceremony and that, with special prayers, God’s spiritual blessing and purification are conferred through Moon.

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To Moon, Communism is equivalent to Satan. Anti-Communism is the political backbone of his movement.

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Both the theology and what were understood as the practices of the Unification Church have been anathema to main-line Christians in Korea. Moon himself was excommunicated by the Presbyterian Church in Korea as long ago as 1948.

His church has not been accepted as a member of either the National Council of Churches or the National Association of Evangelicals in Korea, both of whom state unequivocally that the Unification Church is not Christian.

But Korea is used to offbeat religious movements. There are dozens of splinter sects and “new religions” there. The Unification Church, or Tong-il Kyo, is one of the largest of these with its claimed membership of 300,000 Koreans.

The Unification Church claims a world membership of about a half million. In the United States the number of followers is estimated at about 10,000 so far with between 2,000 and 3,000 core members. 

[A more accurate assessment would be up to 20,000 in Korea and up to 200,000 as a worldwide total.]

The Unification Church may not be accepted by Korean Christians, but it is openly favored by the present government in Korea, and this sets it apart.

In November 1972 President Park Chung-hee promulgated a new constitution giving himself sweeping power. Christian leaders, among others, mounted effective opposition to it and called for a “democratic” constitution. On January 8, 1974, the president responded by decreeing anyone criticizing the constitution would be tried and, if guilty, imprisoned for up to 15 years.

On February 1, six ministers and evangelists (five Presbyterian and one Methodist) were sentenced to up to 15 years’ imprisonment for their criticism of the constitution. They were judged not by a jury of peers in a civil court, but by a special court-martial at the South Korean Defense Ministry. 

Compare Moon, in this context of South Korean politics. Moon started and directs near Seoul a school to which the Korean government annually sends thousands of civilian officials and military personnel for training in techniques of anti-Communism.

In Moon’s view Communism is ideologically equivalent to Satan. Anti-Communism is therefore the political backbone of his movement. Thus he wins the support (which may be in part financial) of the government. At the same time Moon, as a “religious” leader, lends the administration the aura of respectability that all autocracies find useful when, for both home and overseas consumption, it is most needed.

Moon exports to 40 countries the main components of his religious-political movement: the Divine Principle theology with its Korean messiah coupled with vigorous anti-Communism. Chameleonic, the group changes its coloration depending on locale and circumstances.

Sponsors of the International Federation for Victory over Communism, they take on in the United States a quiet title: the Freedom Leadership Foundation. In Japan, however, where they have the support of right-wing groups, they are openly part of the World Anti-Communist League. Here in the United States they sponsor prayer and fasting “for the Watergate Crisis.” In Japan, at the time of Red China’s seating in the United Nations, it was prayer and fasting “for Victory over Communism.”

Everywhere, political involvement is a high priority. The Freedom Leadership Foundation, a Unification Church subsidiary, openly avows its goal of “ideological victory over Communism in the United States.” Gary Jarmin, the 24-year-old secretary-general of the FLF says that they are already spending $50,000 to $60,000 per year trying to influence senators and congressmen on national security issues.

As a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization, FLF is forbidden to lobby for specific legislation, but Jarmin and his seven colleagues in the work don’t hesitate to carry on “educational” programs for legislative aides. Furthermore, Jarmin says, there will soon be a totally separate, new organization that will engage in direct lobbying and openly support political candidates.*

* See John Marks, “From Korea with Love,” The Washington Monthly, February 1974, page 57

The World Freedom Institute is another branch of the FLF’s work, training young people in anti-Communist techniques from an ideological and “religious” point of view. Its International Leadership Seminars are rigorous.

Applicants must pass a preliminary interview. Alcohol and drugs are not permitted, smoking is allowed only at certain times and places, clothing must be clean and neat. All scheduled activities must be attended from 7 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. daily, especially the lectures on Divine Principle, Communism, and Unification thought as a harmony of the Judeo-Christian image of God and the Eastern principle of yin-yang.

For all this, it must be said that political action within the Unification Church is probably limited to a few at center. Moon’s young converts may not be aware of the political side of their movement at all except in the most general terms.

If they wave banners and rally for Nixon, they feel it is because he is ordained by God and given power to be President at this time. Essentially they want to change the moral and spiritual order. They are committed to that, and for them it is enough.

Wherever they go, the Unification Church works to enlist the young. According to those who know the movement in Korea, Japan, and the United States, they are largely the disenchanted young—those whose activism in the ’60s and early ’70s has seemed to bring scant results, those who are turned off by the institutionalized establishment, who are looking for commitment and community, who want not just something but someone to believe in, who want unequivocal answers within a framework of discipline.

There are thousands of young Americans who, in our current retreat from involvement into privatism, fit this description. Moon’s followers are among them. Here in the Unification Church they find instantly a place among their own kind. The hierarchy itself is composed of young people.

The members live in communes that have been set up in most major cities of the country. “It’s like a family,” said one girl who helped establish a new church in Texas. “The whole purpose of the center is based upon God. There’s no premarital sex or drugs or smoking or drinking.” Indeed, Moon thunders against “sexual immorality” as the deadliest of sins.

These are young people who are earnest, sincere, committed, and of high moral character. They are also neat, pleasant, and polite. They are convinced. And they are innocent.

They probably know nothing whatever of Moon’s questionable background or of his strong right-wing political stance. And probably they do not know Christianity well enough (though they study the Bible fervently) to question the theology of Divine Principle. But they have a staunch belief in basic moral values and the possibility and power of spiritual redemption.

If you have not already seen the members of the Unification Church in your town, you will. They have centers in all 50 states and they are busy soliciting both converts and money.

In New York they have reportedly purchased a large old house a few blocks from the Columbia University campus and are offering rooms there for a low rent. They have established an office on the campus under the name of “Collegiate Association for Research of Principles” or CARP (appropriating the traditional Christian symbol of the fish) and at the time of this writing are busy recruiting students for a one-week International Leadership Seminar scheduled for the March recess at the former seminary of the Christian Brothers in Barrytown, New York, which the Unification Church recently purchased.

Some of the Columbia CARP group seem to have had experience in the movement elsewhere. For instance, one young man, a Japanese graduate student, asked a professor at nearby Union Theological Seminary to give him a private crash course in Christianity—something he had not needed for the work in Japan.

To raise money Moon’s followers have so far been selling flowers, home-made candles, bottled arrangements of dried flowers and grasses, and ginseng tea, a herbal tea with medicinal properties.

Everything they earn—everything—goes back to the Unification Church. They claim that when it was necessary to raise $280,000 for a down payment on the Belvedere estate in Tarrytown, the core members across the country dropped everything for eight weeks and did nothing but sell their wares.

Flowers and candles? Yes—and they raised the down payment and more.

In our town on a recent Saturday morning, a young Japanese girl came into a drugstore carrying a small bucket with “Drug Abuse” painted on it in white letters. In her other hand she held bouquets of pink and white carnations wrapped in green wax paper.

“I am Takako,” said the girl. “I am selling these flowers for the One World Crusade. Would you buy some, please?” The high school girl behind the counter looked doubtful but asked, “What is the One World Crusade?”

“Have you heard of the Unification Church?” asked Takako. “We are working against drug abuse.” She held out a paper encased in plastic. At the top in large letters it read: “Immorality/Drug/Abuse/Delinquency/Family Conduct.” Then it introduced Takako and again mentioned the program against drug abuse.

A bystander, a man, asked, “What is this program against drug abuse? I am interested in that myself.”

Takako struggled with English. “You know the Bible?” she asked. “We have meeting and religious education, and we study the secrets of the Bible.”

“But your program against drugs?” the man persisted.

“We work against drugs from the heart,” said Takako. “It is a heart thing, a heart change.”

The man smiled and shook his head. The drugstore owner and a woman customer each bought a bouquet.

This young Japanese girl has left her natural family back in Japan and has come halfway around the world to be part of another family, the Unification Family. This supplants her mother and father, her brothers and sisters. According to Unification doctrine they are impure and imperfect.

She herself, as she is initiated into the Unification Church, will be made pure, and her real family from now on is the group of purified and to-be-purified members like herself. The sadness she has caused (and this sadness is widespread in the homes these young people have left) is of no consequence.

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Flowers, candles, tea—where does the real money come from that supports the projects of Moon’s church?

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The idea of family is central to Moon’s teaching. The family gives blessing. At the top is the vast human family, then the national family, finally the marital family. One must be in a family to be saved, for the family provides the basic structure for the new Eden.

Most of the young people who join the Unification Church are single. After a period of membership—usually at least three years—they may be married if they have achieved an acceptable spiritual level. Marriages are arranged—a vast improvement, Moon’s followers say, over the chaotic system of personal choice that has destroyed the American family.

The arrangements used to be made by Moon himself, who knew most individual members in the early days and had, it is said, an uncanny gift for sizing up those he did not know. Now, with the growth of the movement, the arrangement of marriages will surely have to be delegated to senior members of the Family.

In 1970 Moon gathered a great group together in Seoul and performed a mass marriage of 777 couples. For those whom he joins, his blessing is a cherished benediction. It carries the notion that Moon himself is the giver of offspring to those he blesses and it makes pure the tainted blood of those who are wed.

Where does the money come from that supports the Unification Church? No one seems able to find out.

The Unification Church owns estates, a conference center, and many town houses (such as the handsome one on East 71st Street in New York).

It supports its core members in their work of evangelism, teaching, and preaching at a cost for food, clothing, and shelter conservatively estimated at $5 million per year. It brings hundreds of young Germans, Austrians, Japanese, and Koreans to this country at its expense, not theirs.

It pays for full-page ads in big newspapers. It publishes a tabloid newspaper, books, leaflets. It rents large meeting halls and lecture facilities for its leader to speak in. It invites the country’s leaders to banquets at the best hotels.

Where does the money come from? Not primarily from selling flowers, candles, and ginseng tea, though this effort should not be downgraded or underestimated. The member-businesses (in San Francisco, a printing press; in Denver, a cleaning establishment; in Washington, a new tea house) may swell the coffers but not substantially.

Moon himself is reputed to be a millionaire, the head of a sizeable conglomerate in Korea that product marble vases, machine parts, ginseng tea, pharmaceuticals, titanium, air rifles and other items. The value of the empire is estimated at $10 to $15 million. Some followers claim that Moon plows the profits back into the Unification Church, but others insist the industries belong to Moon, who has become a very wealthy man.

What outside backing does Moon have? Substantial sums may come from right wing Japanese industrialists and groups that are eager to reestablish the economic power Japan once held over Korea and who consider Moon “their man.” Former Japanese Prime Minister Kishi, leader of the violently anti-Peking faction of the Liberal Democratic Party, is actively associated with Moon’s International Federation for Victory over Communism.

The big question is: Does the Korean government back Moon? In the article in The Washington Monthly referred to above, John Marks, a student of the CIA in the U.S. and other countries, tackles this question. The Korean CIA, Marks points out, has on occasion secretly subsidized “private” organizations like the Unification Church if they will improve Korea’s image. It would certainly be interested, he says, in a “burgeoning religious-political movement run by a Korean who supports virtually all of the goals and who is in a position to work and lobby for its government’s position on the American political scene.”

Whatever the sources of its money, the Unification Church is in excellent shape financially, and that is very important to it. In Moon’s thinking, money is power and power indicates the blessing of God. God is on the side of power and wealth.

Moon and his followers have come a long way down the road from the mountainside where an earlier messiah, who had nowhere to lay his head, taught his disciples: “Blessed are the poor. Blessed are the meek. They shall inherit the earth.”                  A.D.

Jane Mook is a freelance writer and an occasional contributor to A.D. In addition to mission articles, she has compiled our portfolios of religious art at Christmas and Easter. Her home is in Tenafly, New Jersey.

A few of Sun Myung Moon’s Front Groups

The Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity

The Unification Church

Project Unity

One World Crusade

International Cultural Foundation (ICF)

International Federation for Victory over Communism (IFVOC)

Collegiate Association for the Research of Principles (CARP)

Freedom Leadership Foundation (FLF)

World Freedom Institute

American Youth for a Just Peace

The Little Angels of Korea

Professors’ World Peace Academy (PWPA)

Committee for Responsible Dialogue

Tong-Il Industry Company

Il-Hwa Pharmaceutical Company

Il-Shin Stoneworks Company

Tong Wha Titanium Company

Tae Han Rutile Company [rutile = titanium dioxide]

Where Moon got his theology from

Moon’s theology for his pikareum sex rituals with all the 36 wives

The FFWPU is unequivocally not Christian

Sun Myung Moon: The Emperor of the Universe

United States Congressional investigation of Moon’s organization

10th July >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflection on Matthew 9:18-26 for Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time: 'She is asleep’.

Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time 10th July >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflection on Matthew 9:18-26 for Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time: 'She is asleep’. Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time Gospel (Europe, New Zealand, Australia, Canada & Southern Africa) Matthew 9:18-26 While Jesus was speaking, up came one of the officials, who bowed low in front of him and said, ‘My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her and her life will be saved.’ Jesus rose and, with his disciples, followed him. Then from behind him came a woman, who had suffered from a haemorrhage for twelve years, and she touched the fringe of his cloak, for she said to herself, ‘If I can only touch his cloak I shall be well again.’ Jesus turned round and saw her; and he said to her, ‘Courage, my daughter, your faith has restored you to health.’ And from that moment the woman was well again. When Jesus reached the official’s house and saw the flute-players, with the crowd making a commotion he said, ‘Get out of here; the little girl is not dead, she is asleep.’ And they laughed at him. But when the people had been turned out he went inside and took the little girl by the hand; and she stood up. And the news spread all round the countryside. Gospel (USA) Matthew 9:18-26 My daughter has just died, but come and she will live. While Jesus was speaking, an official came forward, knelt down before him, and said, “My daughter has just died. But come, lay your hand on her, and she will live.” Jesus rose and followed him, and so did his disciples. A woman suffering hemorrhages for twelve years came up behind him and touched the tassel on his cloak. She said to herself, “If only I can touch his cloak, I shall be cured.” Jesus turned around and saw her, and said, “Courage, daughter! Your faith has saved you.” And from that hour the woman was cured. When Jesus arrived at the official’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd who were making a commotion, he said, “Go away! The girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they ridiculed him. When the crowd was put out, he came and took her by the hand, and the little girl arose. And news of this spread throughout all that land. Reflections (6) (i) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time There is nothing sadder than the funeral of a child. When a child dies everyone is rendered speechless. What words could be adequate to address such loss and grief experienced by the child’s parents? The prayer of the grieving father to Jesus in today’s gospel reading would surely find an echo in the heart of every grieving parent, ‘My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her and her life will be saved’. It is a prayer which acknowledges the dark reality of the death of a child, ‘my daughter has just died’, but also expresses hope that somehow this death will not have the last word, ‘lay your hands on her and her life will be saved’. Jesus went on to raise this man’s daughter to life. There must have been many children who died in the time and place of Jesus whom Jesus did not restore to life. However, his raising of the official’s daughter to life served as a sign for all grieving parents. God’s power in Jesus will always work to bring new life out of every death. Jesus’ own experience of death has not abolished death, but his resurrection from the dead reveals that death does not have the last word. Our relationship with God and God’s relationship with us will endure beyond the moment of physical death, just as Jesus’ death was not the end of his relationship with God or of God’s relationship with him. If our relationship with God does not end with death, neither will our various human relationships end, because they are all contained within our relationship with God. In coming closer to God, we come closer to each other. And/Or (ii) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time In the gospel reading Jesus is approached by two people who were very different. One was a synagogue official, who had a recognized and important religious role within the community. The other was a woman who suffered from a flow of blood, and who, in virtue of that condition, would have been considered ritually unclean, and, therefore, excluded from the synagogue. Not only were these two people at opposite ends of the religious spectrum of the time, but the way they approach Jesus is very different. The official comes up to him very publicly, bowing low in front of him. The woman secretly touches the fringe of Jesus’ cloak, not wanting to be noticed. In spite of their different standing within the community and their different approaches to Jesus, what they had in common was their great faith in Jesus and in his saving power. Jesus responded equally generously to both of these people, healing the official’s daughter and healing the woman of her condition. The gospel reading suggests that what matters to the Lord is not our standing in the community or how we approach him, how we pray, but the strength of our faith in him, the quality of our relationship with him. According to the opening line of today’s first reading, the Lord lured the people of Israel into the wilderness to speak to their heart. The Lord speaks to the heart of all of us who approach him and he always responds to our plea for help. And/Or (iii) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time In the Jewish Scriptures one of the ways God speaks to people is through their dreams. In this morning’s first reading we find one of the most memorable dreams in the Jewish Scriptures, Jacob’s dream of a ladder reaching between heaven and earth with the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. When Jacob woke from his dream he said, ‘the Lord is in this place and I never knew it… this is the gate of heaven’. Jacob had a profound sense of God’s presence. In the gospel reading this morning, two very different people also had a profound sense of God’s presence, a synagogue official and a woman whose physical condition would have excluded her from the synagogue. They each experienced God’s life-giving presence in a way that was not available to Jacob; they experienced God in the person of Jesus. Jesus is Emmanuel, God-with-us, and he is God-with-us until the end of time. Like the official and the woman, we too live in the presence of Jesus, God-with-us. Yet, like Jacob, we often have reason to say, ‘The Lord is in this place and I never knew it’. We are not always aware of the Lord’s presence. Yet, because the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, there is a sense in which we always stand before what Jacob calls ‘the gate of heaven’. Heaven comes to earth in the person of the Lord, God-with-us. Like the woman in the gospel reading, we are invited to reach out in faith and touch the Lord who is always and everywhere present to us. And/Or (iv) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time In this morning’s gospel reading two people approach Jesus in their need, a synagogue official who approaches Jesus on behalf of his daughter and a woman with a haemorrhage who approaches Jesus on her own behalf. The way the people approach Jesus is quite different. The synagogue official approaches Jesus in a very public way, bowing low in front of him and speaking aloud his need and his request. The woman approaches Jesus very privately, touching the fringe of his cloak, and speaking only to herself. None of us approaches the Lord in exactly the same way. Our way of relating to the Lord always has a quality that is unique to each of us, just as we each have a unique way of relating to others people. Both the synagogue official and the woman were people of faith but they each expressed their faith very differently. Our faith brings us together as a community of faith, but in doing so it does not suppress our individuality. In the gospel Jesus responded generously to the very different approaches of the synagogue official and of the woman. He made no distinction between them but was equally responsive to their need and their cry for help. The Lord’s response to us is always shaped by and respectful of the unique way that we approach him. And/Or (v) Monday, Fourteenth week in Ordinary Time I am always struck by the contrast in the way that the two people approach Jesus in today’s gospel reading. The synagogue approached Jesus in a very public way on behalf of his daughter’s healing, bowing low before Jesus before others. The woman approached Jesus in a very private way, coming up behind him to touch the fringe of his cloak for her own healing. She would have been quite happy not to be noticed by anyone. We each approach the Lord differently because we are all different and the circumstances of our lives are different. Our relationship with the Lord is a deeply personal one. As we relate to each other out of our uniqueness, so too we relate to the Lord out of our unique personality and history. Even when we are praying together, as we do at Mass, reciting the same prayers together, we do so in a way that is personal to each one of us. The Lord respected the very different way that the two people approached him in the gospel reading and responded to each of them equally. The Lord respects us in our uniqueness. He recognized and rejoices in the personal nature of our faith. He calls us by name, respecting our individuality. The Christian faith is a communal faith; we journey together to the Lord who is always at work to form a community of believers. Yet, that communal nature of our faith never eradicates what is unique to each of us. As Paul recognized very clear, the church is a unity in diversity, like a human body. And/Or (vi) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time In the gospel reading this morning, two people approach Jesus for healing. One of them, a synagogue official, asks Jesus to come and touch his daughter who has just died, laying his hands on her. The other, a woman with a flow of blood, comes to touch Jesus for herself. Indeed, she limits herself to touching the fringe of his cloak. Both the official and the woman recognize the healing power of touching Jesus or being touched by Jesus. The woman was able to come and touch Jesus for herself. The daughter of the official could not come to Jesus because she had died, and, so, her father came to Jesus on her behalf and asked him to come and touch her. Both of these people, the official and the woman, speak of the two ways that we ourselves often approach Jesus. Like the woman, we often come before him in our own need, seeking to touch the Lord in faith, in our prayer. Like the official, we sometimes come before the Lord in prayer, interceding with him for others, asking him to come into the life of someone who is dear to us. Both forms of prayer, the prayer for our own needs and the prayer for others, are expressions of our faith in the life-giving touch of Jesus. Whether we come before the Lord in the guise of the official or in the guise of the woman, we will be opening up ourselves and those for whom we pray to the Lord’s life-giving and healing presence. Fr. Martin Hogan, Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin, D03 AO62, Ireland. Parish Website: www.stjohnsclontarf.ieJoinus via our webcam. Twitter: @SJtBClontarfRC. Facebook: St John the Baptist RC Parish, Clontarf. Tumblr: Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin.

Ministry with Undocumented Unaccompanied Migrant Children

Borders divide and separate people – assigning – usually – a more privileged space on one side and a less privileged space on the other. Throughout human history . . . people have drawn lines in the sand to tell others, “You can come this far, no farther.” Sometimes the lines are drawn by the weak in an attempt to protect themselves, but more often they are defined by the strong in order to guarantee themselves a greater measure of resources and power.

--  Jerry H Gill, Borderlands Theology

In 2016, I served as volunteer Protestant chaplain at the Tucson Southwest Key detention center for undocumented and unaccompanied minors. My ‘pastorate” consisted of a congregation of approximately 300-350 transient children under 18 from the most impoverished, corrupt, and violent countries of Central America. Following is a chapter from my Doctoral thesis, Being church in the Borderlands. (2018, Drew Theological School)

Southwest Key Detention Center for Unaccompanied and Undocumented Minors

In the spring of 2016, I was contacted by the Southwest Key detention facility in Tucson about providing Protestant23 worship services in Spanish for the undocumented, unaccompanied minor children seeking asylum who were flooding the U.S.-Mexico border, some of whom were in protective detention in Tucson. Southwest Key is a private, non-profit organization contracted by the Department of Homeland Security to provide a safe detention setting for children from birth to 17 years old. According to their website, “Southwest Key empowers youth and their families to make positive changes in their lives including at our 27 immigrant children's shelters in Texas, Arizona and California,” with 20,000 unaccompanied minors under the age of 18 in custody in their facilities at any given time.24 Later in 2016, another detention facility that would house 1,000 children was built in the state of Texas to respond to the ever-increasing numbers of unaccompanied children from Central America. The Southwest Key facility in Tucson was designed to house up to 287 children.25 At the end of 2016, the number of children from the Northern Triangle of Central America participating in the Protestant service exceeded capacity.

Every Wednesday I gathered up my clergy stole, MP3 recordings of praise music in Spanish, and copies of lectionary readings and words to the songs and traveled the 30 minutes from my eastside church to Southwest Key’s detention center on the west side of Tucson for unaccompanied, undocumented, immigrant children and youth. On my first visit, I passed the center several times before I realized that that it was a nondescript brown building close to the heart of town. No one would suspect that almost 300 children are housed there, children who have escaped the grinding poverty, violence, environmental devastation, and lack of opportunity to grow and thrive in their home countries in Central America. No one would guess that the former Howard Johnson Inn, later the bustling University of Arizona International Student Housing Complex, is now a Homeland Securities Center for the detention of almost 300 children crossing the U.S.- Mexico border unaccompanied and without proper immigration papers.

Once past the locked front doors, security check-in and guards, a member of my church and I were escorted to the large bright and colorful cafeteria where the children ate their meals and played board games in-between scheduled classes and other activities. Every Wednesday at 3:30 pm the cafeteria became a sanctuary. Tables disappeared and chairs were rearranged in rows of 30. In the early weeks we met in the gym which easily accommodated the original 30 boys but soon girls began to arrive too. As the numbers increased each week, we grew out of the gymnasium and into the largest space available, the cafeteria. The numbers of children and youth doubled and then doubled again until the cafeteria worship space was packed with children.

I was the only bilingual female Protestant minister to fill an expressed need and contractual requirement to lead “Evangelical” worship services. For some reason, most of the children come to the center from a variety of Protestant churches, mostly Pentecostal and others identifying as Evangelical and Christian, which, in Latin America, does not include Catholics. While these children had not experienced a female minister before, I never for a moment felt a lack of respect or engagement from them. The children and youth arrived for the Protestant worship service in small groups, chaperoned by two adult monitors - guards who watched, counted, and reported their movements 24 hours a day. They were shepherded into the long rows of chairs, while the monitors counted and recounted to make sure no one had gone missing. A few, mostly boys, arrived eager to engage, ready for the next adventure, whatever it might be. Most of the children looked deeply weary and lost. Others stared straight ahead and moved robotically. A few hugged a teddy bear or other small stuffed animal. As the children filed into the make-shift worship space, I struggled with the dissonance between worship at my local church. It broke my heart to know that this small and protected space was just a brief reprieve from a life of suffering.

We prayed together in the custom of the indigenous people with whom I had ministered in southern Mexico. Prayers could last for ten minutes or more with all of us praying loudly in our own language, thanking God for all that God had done, and telling God what to do next. The expectation was that God listened and responded to these strong prayers, spoken individually but joined together as one keening voice. Most of the children hid their faces behind their open palms and sobbed their prayers. Were they reliving the dangerous circumstances of their journeys, missing their families, worried about being sent back to their countries of origin, which would mean almost certain death? I never knew. But I got a tiny glimpse when they came forward for a private prayer and blessing with me. Sometimes I couldn’t understand their indigenous dialect, but their bodies, especially their eyes, spoke of great and prolonged suffering.

These were small children that looked years younger than their actual age due to malnutrition and they literally were worn thin by the journey. Despite the desperation of their circumstances, while they were at the shelter, they were treated like children, and played like children. Their unabashed joy at eating a good meal, coming to worship, playing soccer, and going to school was one of my most precious takeaways from my time with them. Another was their enthusiasm and depth of engagement in worship. They responded respectfully to me, their tall “Gringa”26 pastor. Unlike most children of the same age from the U.S., they participated fully and unabashedly without any prompting or fidgeting. They came hungry for a word to sustain them, for song to lift them, and for prayer to open a channel to God’s presence. When I asked for volunteers to read scripture, hands shot up, and those who read did so with pride and care. We sang songs I had found on the internet, religious songs in Spanish, but with an up tempo I knew the children would enjoy. After one time through, they had memorized and internalized the words. You could literally see the Word made Flesh in and through them as they sang full voiced and embodied.

Over time, the numbers of children increased from 300 or more, with a dramatic increase of girls. I was provided with big speakers and a microphone and found myself leading what I would call an “Evangelical-liberation theology worship service” to a packed house. The energy was spirited and we raised the roof with song. But more than the experience of bliss through song and prayer, the content of my reflections were relevant to their lives as migrant/strangers – unwelcome and “illegal.” The children resonated strongly with Jesus as migrant, Mary as unwed teenage mother, oppressed workers, and an unyielding interpretation of “law.” That was something new for them and they sat up and listened.

The girls though, were very shy at first, some only lifted their gaze from the floor after months of services with me. In my trips to the desert with the Tucson Samaritans, a group dedicated to saving migrant lives in the desert, I had come upon “trophy trees” where women and girls’ panties were hung, signaling a threshold only crossed through rape. The girls at the Center told me they knew the probability of sexual assault and rape when they set out on their journey, and that those who could took precautionary measures to avoid pregnancy. Because girls were far outnumbered by men and boys on the journey north, some tried to disguise themselves as boys, to no avail.

Since I was limited to an hour, I tried to make eye contact with every child, especially girls, whose affect was much more downcast. For me, seeing them had to be blessing enough, and over time, I believe it did have a healing effect. We sang the eight to ten songs over and over because I hoped they would have an embodied memory of a time when they were happy and safe in God’s house. The staff, who over time joined in worship with us, told me that they and the children sang the songs all day long and would burst into song over meals. Those “hymns”, which, at an earlier time and context I would have eschewed as praise music, took us deep into the heart of God. The sense of consolation and relief and hope were palpable in the cafeteria-turned-sanctuary. Even the staff began to join in and approached me after worship for a private moment in prayer. The children also appreciated individual blessings at the end of worship, the only time when I could actually place a hand on a child. Protected from inappropriate physical contact, they were also isolated from healing touch. They formed a line out the door and waited patiently as each child came forward to be prayed over and blessed. These kids were starved for blessing.

The children’s names have blurred for me, as sometimes they were either quickly transferred to another detention facility or placed with a family member who would sponsor them for asylum. I never knew what happened to these children, but the imprint their presence left on my soul is strong. Several leaders emerged from within the groups, and I got to know them by their particular eagerness for worship or sadness during prayer. One moment they would be singing full force, to the point where their voices carried to all parts of the building, and the next moment their heads would be bowed, faces hidden behind hands or song sheets as they wept out their prayers. These were children who had not experienced happy and healthy childhoods. Quite the contrary, they came from the violence of poverty and guns, crossed a desert of almost unimaginable peril, to be placed, for at least a while, in a safe place where they would be fed, educated, treated for medical problems, and allowed to worship. For those who came to worship with me, the hour was a time to carry the past into the room and marry it to hope, albeit ever so small, of a better future, of a God who was present with them.

One teenager, whom I will call Berta, was eager from the beginning to engage with me through scripture and song. She volunteered to lead songs that only she and the other children knew. I would sit back and watch them recapture a bit of their past, something to cling to, even as they experienced a liberating theology and female pastor that they had never known before. Berta asked me for my Facebook address, but I wasn’t allowed to share such personal information. She wrote down my name, which I hope she has retained as a remembrance that someone loved her here in this country where she and children like her were not welcomed. One day she disappeared as so many others did. I do not know to what or whom, but I trust that she was a Meriam or Hannah or Hagar or Mary or Anna from the Bible. She left me with the impression that she would find her way home, wherever that ended up being.

A young man, whom I will call Fernando, probably 15 years old - although he looked like he was much younger - always volunteered to read scripture and asked to keep the paper with the reading on it. This, he said, he took to his room to meditate on and memorize. Fernando also led the children in songs from his Guatemalan church. While the children loved the songs I introduced to them, they showed a particular joy in singing their own traditional songs, sometimes in their Mayan languages. Fernando usually had a word to share about the readings. He told me later that he had been a pastor at his home church. Fernando had to be a minor to be here – a minor who was a pastor and had made the two-thousand-mile journey on the top of a train – no longer a child inside but still clearly with remnants of his former identity that anchored him in this new place.

My favorite time with the children, although I too often could not do it because of the number of children and lack of time, was when they came to me for private prayer and blessings. They lined up around the cafeteria-turned-sanctuary and came forward for a laying on of hands and prayer. I had never understood how priests in Chiapas could hear confession in a language they didn’t understand and still be a helpful pastoral presence. But once I had touched and prayed with children who either didn’t speak Spanish or whom I could not understand, I knew that this mattered. A bond was created. They were seen and blessed with respect and tenderness, and asked every week for more of that. The blessing of a total stranger, a female pastor, a Gringa, who cared about them and saw God in them was a very rare experience for these children in transit in one of the worst journeys a child can experience. I can still feel those moments. They were a blessing for me as well.

Most Wednesdays there were too many children and too little time to bless all of them, even if I had a helper or two from church. Still, taking a note from Jesus’ encounter with the hemorrhaging woman, I blessed the children with my eyes when I could not actually touch them. I encouraged RCUCC members who accompanied me to really see each child and be an instrument of God’s love, blessing them through seeing them, rather than touching them. The girls in particular, responded well to being seen, as they had come from a culture of machismo27 in which girls and women were not truly seen as subjects of their own lives. They stood taller, lifted their head and eyes, and held my gaze more with each successive week’s worship.

We learned that these children were sent to the center within 24 hours of apprehension by Border Patrol and remained in custody between a few days and several months while their immigration status was being negotiated. The staff of Southwest Key worked to find family members in the U.S. who could take in these unaccompanied minor children. Most family members in the U.S. who agreed to be sponsors were, themselves, also undocumented, which makes sponsoring a child for asylum very precarious for everyone involved. Even if a child is placed with a family member in the U.S., their stay in the U.S. is not guaranteed. Many would be returned home where their families would face a huge debt for their journey, and the same or worse violent conditions from which they had fled.

Many of these children had left their lives and loved ones behind, having traveled thousands of miles alone from their home countries in Central America, and hanging onto the tops and sides of freight trains called La Bestia (The Beast).28 Illegal travel aboard La Bestia is controlled by gangs notorious for their brutality. The children’s journeys are extremely dangerous, as human smugglers, Mexican and U.S. vigilante groups, ranchers, and local law and immigration enforcement officers prey upon them. If these vulnerable kids don’t find handholds along the sides or tops of trains, they make the trip north packed into buses and vans.29 The drivers are known to stop abruptly to sell and transfer their human “load” to another driver, who sometimes has different designs on their cargo than was originally intended. Many children make the last 60 miles across the perilous Sonoran Desert on foot. An adult family member accompanies a few, but most of the unaccompanied children come alone and join with a group of adults and a coyote, human smuggler. That they make it to the shelter at all is something of a miracle. If they make it, most take weeks to heal their feet from infected blisters.

22 “No matter who you are or where you are on life’s journey, you are welcome here,” from the “Extravagant Welcome Brochure” of the United Church of Christ.

23 The Children at Southwest Key were divided into two groups, “Evangélicos” (Evangelicals) and Católicos (Catholics). No distinction was made for any other denomination or religion. As a Protestant pastor, I was considered to be “la Pastora Evangélica.”

24 “Immigrant Children's Shelters,” Southwest Key, accessed September 24, 2016, http://www.swkey.org/programs/shelters/.

25 Perla Trevizo, “Shelter for Unaccompanied Minors "Homey" Tour Reveals,” Arizona Daily Star, December 8, 2015, accessed September 24, 2016, http://tucson.com/news/local/shelter-for-unaccompanied-minors-homey-tour- reveals/article_9ef8c729-05fe-516b-ba54-4e3cc21d8a8a.html.

26 The word Gringo/a derives from the U.S. invasion of Mexico City, in which the Mexicans are said to have chanted “Green – go home!” because the Marines’ uniforms were green. The term is since generally taken to mean a foreigner in Spain and Latin America.

27 Machismo connotes exaggerated masculinity, virility, male chauvinism.

28 For a better understanding of children’s journey aboard la Bestia, see Sonia Nazario, Enrique's Journey : The True Story of a Boy Determined to Reunite with His Mother (New York: Delacorte Press, 2013).

29 Oscar Martinez, The Beast: Riding the Rails and Dodging the Narcos on the Migrant Trail, ed. Kindle (New York: Verso, 2014).

09/17/2018 DAB Transcript

Isaiah 25:1-28:13, Galatians 3:10-22, Ps 61:1-8, Proverbs 23:17-18

Today is the 17th day of September. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I'm Brian. It's great to be here with you today. I hope you're doing well and that you are as excited as I am for what the scriptures will bring into our lives today and throughout this week as we continue our journey together forward. And that journey forward will take us back into the book of Isaiah. And we're working our way through Isaiah now and we're reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Isaiah 25:1 - 28:13 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, as we get our week going today, we come to an important doctrine in the Christian faith that is found in this letter to the Galatians. Have you ever heard the term justification by faith? This is how we get here. So, Paul says, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us because it is written, Cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. The purpose was that the blessing of Abraham would come to the Gentiles by Christ Jesus so that we could receive the promised Spirit through faith. So,, those two verses from Galatians today pretty much encapsulate the crux of Paul's theological position for presenting the gospel to his fellow Hebrews and the hope that he had for the Gentiles. And it outlines what we just said. It outlines the doctrine of justification through faith. So, since Paul ended up dying for his convictions, we know that he fully believed that Jesus had given him this revelation personally. And because we know Paul was trained in the mosaic law as a Pharisee,  we can surmise the spiritual disruption this revelation brought to his personal life way before he ever became a controversial figure in the early days of the church. So, before Paul became a disruptive figure, he had to first be disrupted. Paul's experiences with Jesus definitely disrupted him and flew in the face of what he thought he knew about God. Because, remember, Paul was trying to stamp out, wipe the name of Jesus from the lips of anyone who would speak it. So, he was disrupted, not only in what he  thought he knew about God but also in his theological training. Which forced Paul to go back through the whole story of the Hebrew people, which were his own people. Forced him to deeply consider Moses because mosaic law was the centerpiece of their entire religious experience. So, Paul had to think this whole thing through. And he came to some conclusions. So, it was Moses who led God's people out of Egyptian slavery. And it was through Moses that the law was given. But Paul wanted to know the story before the story. And he looked to what happened long before Moses for the answers, which brought him to Abraham where the whole thing began. God made a promise to raise up a people through Abraham through which all the nations of the world would be blessed. So, for Paul, all the nations of the world being blessed explicitly must have been referring to non-Jewish people as well, right? Gentiles. And he realized that the whole story, the whole Hebrew story, began with a promise and not a law. This is a big deal for Paul. It would have been a big deal for any Pharisee or any Sadducee. So, Abraham believed the promise through faith. And God considered him righteous, not because he obeyed a rule, but because he trusted God. He put his faith in God and in God's promise. So, in thinking that through, Paul realized when that promise was made and Abraham believed that promise, there was no law to obey. That law wouldn't come for 430 more years. So, if we follow the logic, the law couldn't be the means by which a person could be made right with God because Abraham and everybody who believed the promise after Abraham, including Moses, they didn't have a law to obey in the first place. And this is what made Paul a controversial figure, right? Because it sounded heretical. It even sounded blasphemous. People tried to kill him over this. And he was simply trying to tell his fellow Hebrews their own story and revealing how Jesus intersects and is a part of that story. He's just trying to help them to understand that the law was never the thing designed to make them right before God. It was faith in a promise. And so Paul summarized it by saying, Is the law, therefore, contrary to God's promises? Absolutely not. For if the law had been granted with the ability to give life, than righteousness would certainly be on the basis of the law. But the scripture imprisoned everything under sin's power so that the promise might be given on the basis of faith in Jesus Christ to those who believe. And this is how we arrive at the doctrine of justification by faith that has been passed on through the generations.

Prayer:

And so Father, we put our faith and our hope in the promise. And You have promised that You will never leave us or forsake us. We put our faith and hope in Your promises. And we invite Your Holy Spirit to increase our faith and lead us into all truth. And we ask this, knowing that You will answer. And we put our faith and hope in You and You alone. Come Holy Spirit, we pray. In Jesus name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website. It's home base. And it's certainly where you can keep up with what's going on around here.

The prayer wall lives there. The resources in the Daily Audio Bible shop are there. Ways to connect with others are there. All these things are also in the Daily Audio Bible app. So stay connected to each other as we stay connected to this journey that we're on, making our way through the whole Bible this year.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if what's happening here in taking this journey through the Scriptures together is meaningful and life-giving to you and God is using it in your life, than thank you for being a life-giving source so that it can continue to burn on. There is a link on the homepage of dailyaudiobible.com. If you're using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the give button in the upper right-hand corner, or if you prefer, the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996,  Spring Hill, Tennessee, 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

And that's it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise: 

Good morning fellow DABbers. This is Joanne and Marie from Southern California. Today is Thursday, September 13th and I’m calling for prayer for wisdom, for discernment. I have been anxious for a couple of months cause I foolishly went off my meds and I’ve been back on them for two weeks; however, my anxiety is peaked! My psychiatrist has retired and I am trying to get into a psychiatrist, but the soonest I can get there is October. So, I am on the waiting list. And, so, my prayer is that I please get on…get to a psychiatrist sooner so I can get my meds straightened out. Right now I am on a leave of absence to take care of my dad who has dementia. And I’m sure that is why my anxiety is spiked. So, there you have it my friends. Again, my name is Joanne and Marie. I do covet your prayers and I thank you very much. God bless you and have a fabulous day. Thank you.

Hello family. This is Verna from Gainesville Florida. I am GG’s mom. I hardly ever call but I listen and keep up with DAB friends on Facebook. I’m calling today because I just heard Annette Allison mentioned Nana Jones. When she said that name my ears pricked up as I recently __ I was still on the DAB. Nana, the last time you call you were feeling discouraged about your daughter Tiffany who was working as an exotic dancer. I called and told you I was putting Tiffany on my list of people I pray an expanded version of the Lord’s prayer over. It’s a little different every day but it covers all the primary bases. It’d be great to hear an update on your daughter and also how your granddaughter’s is doing. I imagine she’s in school now. I’ve had and still have some rebel children, so those like Tiffany and Elizabeth Joy have a special place in my heart. I love this community and I look forward to meeting each of you one day. Thank you for your prayers for our family. The Lord is good. Bye-bye.

Hi you guys this is Chris calling from Canada and I just wanted to take a minute to pray for those affected with the North Carolina and the Florence hurricane and that Lord You would just keep those people safe there and that Lord You would just keep Your hand and Your love upon all of them. So, hope those who are affected are safe and we hear about your stories on the DAB. Thanks. God bless.

Hey, this is Janet from Georgia, hopefully soon to be Alabama. Today is 14th September. I can’t believe I’m actually calling but I wanted to reach out to Candice from Oregon regarding her son Micah. I absolutely love the way that you worded the prayer for your son to come to God and I need to write it down and start praying that for my son. He also struggles with addiction and with doubts about God. But anyway, I just really love the way you worded that and I pray for your son and his court date. And yes, I love this podcast and I love this group. It’s the safest group that I know of where I can share myself and I think Brian and Jill get a lot of the credit for that. Thanks everybody. Bye-bye.

Task 2: What has influenced me?

What different things are comprised to form myself? I would not say I am a complicated person, but I am a person of many different aspects. I am not a person that you could put under a certain category or label. Everybody is unique, and everybody is different. Everybody has different inspirations, and everybody has different motivations. Usually when you think of something that inspires you, you think of a certain person that may have helped guided your life, creating your likes and dislikes. When I explore the different things that make the flesh I live within, I think of Culture. I think of certain traditions and norms that have been started before I had ever entered this world as well as significant people. I look into the mirror and I see a mosaic of different things. I see a poet, I see an artist, I see an activist, I see a hip hop lover, I see an avid film seeker, I see someone who is religious, I see someone who admires his surroundings and explores them in greater detail. When I look in the mirror, I see a puzzle, created with different colored pieces.  

First I am going to initialize my base. Something that started the beginning of my life. My christening. I am a Christian protestant male. I have remained this status a few months after I came out of the womb. Ever since I have prayed, went to Church, and have taken different opportunities to confess my sins (a way of asking for forgiveness from God). Now lets explore the base of christianity. Christianity started about 2000 years ago in present day Israel with Jesus Christ and his group of disciples. Jesus was a Jew, he would continue to preach and spread the Jewish way of life, the beautiful religion throughout Israel. Jesus continued to help people practice the faith while healing people and making miracles whither from his finger tips. Eventually the Jewish leader and the Romans felt threatened by Jesus strong faith and power. Therefore they captured him and crucified him. Three days later Jesus resurrected allaboutreligion.org states this evidence about the start of Christianity “Three days later, He would rise to life, having conquered death, to give hope to a hopeless world. Well, it happened just as Jesus taught, and His disciples were witnesses to an amazing miracle. Their teacher, Jesus of Nazareth, died and three days later rose again to become their Messiah. Compelled by a great commission to share the love that the God of this universe had imparted upon them, the disciples began to proclaim this gospel of hope throughout the territory. Thus, from a small group of ordinary men that lived in a small province in Judea about 2000 years ago, the history of the Christian Church began, and the Christian Faith has since spread to the rest of the world. Their gospel message was simple: "For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life" (John 3:16).” Eventually the religion spread to great britain. Being west Indian, the British came to the west Indies to claim many of the Islands and brought the faith of Christianity with them. Thus creating Christianity within my family. Other than creating tradition, I believe what Jesus did to be art “the expression or application of human creative skill to be appreciated primarily for emotional power.” Yet that is not the only art that has influenced my life.

I am a poet. Poetry was a very early form of art, learning to express emotion and care through words. Personally I explored poetry through the famous poet, William Shakespeare. William Shakespeare was a writer, but most importantly a poet, who would write plays for many famous people in 16th century Britain. The first piece from Shakespeare I had ever explored was the play most famous today, Romeo And Juliet. The reason I fell in love with shakespeare’s writing was majorly the emotion that he would profess through his words from character to character. After hearing the story of Romeo And Juliet I began to write poems, instead of creating a scene for my poetry, I would connect the words to myself, Creating deep pieces that resinated with myself. Interestingly Shakespeare was not the first form of poetry. Yet he did receive his motivation from the first form of it. bookstellyouwhy.com stated “The Epic of Gilgamesh often is cited as one of the earliest works of epic poetry, dating back to the 18th century B.C. Consisting of Sumerian poems, it's a text that was discovered through many different Babylonian tablet versions during archaeological excavations.” Yet shakespeare inspired me to write, I have to thank the Sumerian for creating it. The Sumerian created something beautiful for me, but there are many other cultures that  have created something I love.  

Food!!! Everybody has a favorite food, a favorite dish, a favorite something that gets digested. Many people have favorite foods that resonate within their own culture, yet me, I abroad far out of my culture when it comes to my favorite food. Chicken Parm (a breaded chicken cutlet topped with parmesan cheese and tomato sauce with a  side of pasta)! Chicken parm is my all time favorite dish to be served. Living in Toronto where we have a street nicknamed “little Italy” you will get the closest to authentic Italian food you could ever dream to imagine. Food inhibits lots of culture. Food is the basis of what is needed to survive, so when you eat just one meal outside of your culture, you are immediately adapting traits of another culture. When you indulge in a beautiful meal of chicken farm you are actually eating a dish created by two different cultures. wikipedia states “Parmigiana (parmesan and tomato sauce) made with a filling of eggplant is the earliest and still unique Italian version. The origin of the dish is claimed by both the Southern regions of Campania and Sicily. Other variations found outside Italy may include chicken, veal, or another type of meat cutlet or vegetable filling.” Yet the English were actually the ones who started making the dish with Chicken instead of eggplant. Some parts of me as you can see have a very foreign flavor, but others are more  Americanized.

I am a hipster. Well at least my fashion sense is very “hip.” I have a different sense of fashion. You know, the ripped jeans, with the patterned button up shirt tied around my waist, with a distinctive T-shirt and stand out shoes. Yet the hipster style is growing and can be said to be somewhat popular today. The term “hipster” was actually derived from the year 1902. In 1902 the word un-hip was used to describe people who were unaware of their surroundings. As life progressed and fashion progressed people around the year 1940 began to have a very different sense of fashion. These people were then called hipsters as they would try to configure their fashion after their mindset which was the opposite of the word un-hip, being aware of your surroundings. This word was heavily used to describe a 1940’s American jazz group “Hot Jazz.” Who saw themselves on a higher mental level than the average person and dictated their fashion after it. Being a hipster, taking part in American culture, I also have a couple other aspects of myself that are Americanized.  

There are two huge puzzle pieces of myself that have North American written all over them. That is hip hop, an entertainment platform, that is also football, a leisure activity that I more consider to be competitive than leisure. Talking about entertainment, there are many different aspects of it, there are plays, movies, TV shows, but my absolute favorite form of entertainment is music. I enjoy listening to music on the highest of pedestals. Music brings to me so many different emotions, shows me so many different aspects of life. When I listen to music I feel the words to my heart as deeply as if I were singing them. The music genre that has caught my attention heavily for 18 years of life would be hip hop. I love everything about hip hop, the lyrics, the flow and sound of the instrumental and voice on perfect rhythm. I find it beautiful, the perfect unison of self created beats with self created poetry is gorgeous. Just like everything else, hip hop was not created within thin air. There is a story behind it. www.britanica.com states hip hop to be stated as “Although widely considered a synonym for rap music, the term hip-hop refers to a complex culture comprising four elements: deejaying, or “turntabling”; rapping, also known as “MCing” or “rhyming”; graffiti painting, also known as “graf” or “writing”; and “B-boying,” which encompasses hip-hop dance, style, and attitude, along with the sort of virile body language that philosopher Cornel West described as “postural semantics.” (A fifth element, “knowledge of self/consciousness,” is sometimes added to the list of hip-hop elements, particularly by socially conscious hip-hop artists and scholars.) Hip-hop originated in the predominantly African American economically depressed South Bronx section of New York City in the late 1970s. As the hip-hop movement began at society’s margins, its origins are shrouded in myth, enigma, and obfuscation.” The first DJ that kicked off Hip Hop music was a DJ named DJ Clive "Kool Herc" Campbell. Kool Herc was born April 16th, 1955 in Kingston Jamaica. In 1967 he moved to the bronx and helped to engineer  the first hip hop instrumental.  

Exploring the rest of my North American lifestyle, is the grind hard game of football. Football has been a part of my life for a long time and will continue to be a pivotal part of my life. I have been playing football competitively for approximately 10 years. I started playing football at the age of eight, and now I am happy to say I have signed for a scholarship to continue my football career. Playing in America and also Canada, I always thought the game to be created in the U.S, as it is such a loved and passionate game to many of its residence. Doing research i found out that it was actually created in the great north, Canada. The rules and style most like the game of football we play today were created at McGill University in Quebec Canada. www.McGill.ca states the first game of football like this, “The very first modern football games were played in Cambridge, Massachusetts on May 13 and 14, 1874, between McGill University and a squad from Harvard. This “foot-ball” diversion, as  Harvard’s Magenta newspaper called it, was still in its infancy, and the rules evolved even as the match progressed. In fact, the Harvard squad so enjoyed the Canadian innovations (running with the ball, downs and tackling) that they introduced them into a match with Yale the following year—and thus, college football took root in America. Although the Redmen and the Crimson no longer butt helmets on the gridiron, the McGill/Harvard rivalry lives on in an annual rugby match for the Peter Covo Memorial Cup, founded in 1974 in honour of the legendary McGill rugby coach and professor. Harvard may have won that first football game (3-0) back in 1874, but McGill leads the Covo series, having won 17 of 30 games.” Ever since the first games of football have been played, it has been one of the most popular sports throughout North America and  continues to spread today. Even though this game is known as a leisure activity, to me it is far more, it is a game of heart, discipline, and values.

The concluding root of culture that is a major part of myself is Architecture. Yet it is not just architecture, it is a form of cleansing, relaxant, and exercise. The swimming pool. I am practically a fish when it comes to swimming, I could stay in the pool all day and have absolutely zero desire to get out. The swimming pool is a very interesting idea, i mean, who digs a hole in the ground puts water in it and decides to jump in. Not a very intriguing idea until it came to life a very very long time ago. Wikipedia explains the first pool to be built as “Roman emperors had private swimming pools in which fish were also kept, hence one of the Latin words for a pool was piscina. The first heated swimming pool was built by Gaius Maecenas of Rome in the 1st century BC.” Swimming pools were a sign of riches, but also a form for relaxing and refreshment after difficult days. These pools were built using hundreds and thousands of bricks creating a base and a wall, the water would then fill up the pool by man made pipes being attached to natural springs. It is quite interesting seeing the evolution of the first pool. The architecture of the pool has been such an inspiration to myself and my family that we decided to invest in one. For approximately 8 years, Roman culture has also been adapted by myself.  

In a broad view, everybody has multiple counterparts of different cultures, it is not until you deeply invest time into figuring out the roots of culture in different parts of your life that you will realize how cultured you truly are. If I was to label myself with one word, the word I would use is Mosaic. The reason I would use this word is because I am a subject of my environment, I currently live in Canada and my interests seem to be somewhat of a cultural Mosaic.

All comprised to make me…

By: Elijah Blake

10th July >> Fr. Martin's Gospel Reflection on Matthew 9:18-26 for Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time: 'She is asleep'.

Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel (Europe, New Zealand, Australia, Canada & Southern Africa)

Matthew 9:18-26

While Jesus was speaking, up came one of the officials, who bowed low in front of him and said, ‘My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her and her life will be saved.’ Jesus rose and, with his disciples, followed him. Then from behind him came a woman, who had suffered from a haemorrhage for twelve years, and she touched the fringe of his cloak, for she said to herself, ‘If I can only touch his cloak I shall be well again.’ Jesus turned round and saw her; and he said to her, ‘Courage, my daughter, your faith has restored you to health.’ And from that moment the woman was well again.

   When Jesus reached the official’s house and saw the flute-players, with the crowd making a commotion he said, ‘Get out of here; the little girl is not dead, she is asleep.’ And they laughed at him. But when the people had been turned out he went inside and took the little girl by the hand; and she stood up. And the news spread all round the countryside.

Gospel (USA)

Matthew 9:18-26

My daughter has just died, but come and she will live.

While Jesus was speaking, an official came forward, knelt down before him, and said, “My daughter has just died. But come, lay your hand on her, and she will live.” Jesus rose and followed him, and so did his disciples. A woman suffering hemorrhages for twelve years came up behind him and touched the tassel on his cloak. She said to herself, “If only I can touch his cloak, I shall be cured.” Jesus turned around and saw her, and said, “Courage, daughter!  Your faith has saved you.” And from that hour the woman was cured.

   When Jesus arrived at the official’s house and saw the flute players and the crowd who were making a commotion, he said, “Go away! The girl is not dead but sleeping.” And they ridiculed him. When the crowd was put out, he came and took her by the hand, and the little girl arose. And news of this spread throughout all that land.

Reflections (6)

(i)  Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

There is nothing sadder than the funeral of a child. When a child dies everyone is rendered speechless. What words could be adequate to address such loss and grief experienced by the child’s parents? The prayer of the grieving father to Jesus in today’s gospel reading would surely find an echo in the heart of every grieving parent, ‘My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her and her life will be saved’. It is a prayer which acknowledges the dark reality of the death of a child, ‘my daughter has just died’, but also expresses hope that somehow this death will not have the last word, ‘lay your hands on her and her life will be saved’. Jesus went on to raise this man’s daughter to life. There must have been many children who died in the time and place of Jesus whom Jesus did not restore to life. However, his raising of the official’s daughter to life served as a sign for all grieving parents. God’s power in Jesus will always work to bring new life out of every death. Jesus’ own experience of death has not abolished death, but his resurrection from the dead reveals that death does not have the last word. Our relationship with God and God’s relationship with us will endure beyond the moment of physical death, just as Jesus’ death was not the end of his relationship with God or of God’s relationship with him. If our relationship with God does not end with death, neither will our various human relationships end, because they are all contained within our relationship with God. In coming closer to God, we come closer to each other.

And/Or

(ii) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading Jesus is approached by two people who were very different. One was a synagogue official, who had a recognized and important religious role within the community. The other was a woman who suffered from a flow of blood, and who, in virtue of that condition, would have been considered ritually unclean, and, therefore, excluded from the synagogue. Not only were these two people at opposite ends of the religious spectrum of the time, but the way they approach Jesus is very different. The official comes up to him very publicly, bowing low in front of him. The woman secretly touches the fringe of Jesus’ cloak, not wanting to be noticed. In spite of their different standing within the community and their different approaches to Jesus, what they had in common was their great faith in Jesus and in his saving power. Jesus responded equally generously to both of these people, healing the official’s daughter and healing the woman of her condition. The gospel reading suggests that what matters to the Lord is not our standing in the community or how we approach him, how we pray, but the strength of our faith in him, the quality of our relationship with him. According to the opening line of today’s first reading, the Lord lured the people of Israel into the wilderness to speak to their heart. The Lord speaks to the heart of all of us who approach him and he always responds to our plea for help.

And/Or

(iii) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In the Jewish Scriptures one of the ways God speaks to people is through their dreams. In this morning’s first reading we find one of the most memorable dreams in the Jewish Scriptures, Jacob’s dream of a ladder reaching between heaven and earth with the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. When Jacob woke from his dream he said, ‘the Lord is in this place and I never knew it... this is the gate of heaven’. Jacob had a profound sense of God’s presence. In the gospel reading this morning, two very different people also had a profound sense of God’s presence, a synagogue official and a woman whose physical condition would have excluded her from the synagogue. They each experienced God’s life-giving presence in a way that was not available to Jacob; they experienced God in the person of Jesus. Jesus is Emmanuel, God-with-us, and he is God-with-us until the end of time. Like the official and the woman, we too live in the presence of Jesus, God-with-us. Yet, like Jacob, we often have reason to say, ‘The Lord is in this place and I never knew it’. We are not always aware of the Lord’s presence. Yet, because the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, there is a sense in which we always stand before what Jacob calls ‘the gate of heaven’. Heaven comes to earth in the person of the Lord, God-with-us. Like the woman in the gospel reading, we are invited to reach out in faith and touch the Lord who is always and everywhere present to us.

And/Or

(iv) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In this morning’s gospel reading two people approach Jesus in their need, a synagogue official who approaches Jesus on behalf of his daughter and a woman with a haemorrhage who approaches Jesus on her own behalf. The way the people approach Jesus is quite different. The synagogue official approaches Jesus in a very public way, bowing low in front of him and speaking aloud his need and his request. The woman approaches Jesus very privately, touching the fringe of his cloak, and speaking only to herself. None of us approaches the Lord in exactly the same way. Our way of relating to the Lord always has a quality that is unique to each of us, just as we each have a unique way of relating to others people. Both the synagogue official and the woman were people of faith but they each expressed their faith very differently. Our faith brings us together as a community of faith, but in doing so it does not suppress our individuality. In the gospel Jesus responded generously to the very different approaches of the synagogue official and of the woman. He made no distinction between them but was equally responsive to their need and their cry for help. The Lord’s response to us is always shaped by and respectful of the unique way that we approach him.

And/Or

(v) Monday, Fourteenth week in Ordinary Time

I am always struck by the contrast in the way that the two people approach Jesus in today’s gospel reading. The synagogue approached Jesus in a very public way on behalf of his daughter’s healing, bowing low before Jesus before others. The woman approached Jesus in a very private way, coming up behind him to touch the fringe of his cloak for her own healing. She would have been quite happy not to be noticed by anyone. We each approach the Lord differently because we are all different and the circumstances of our lives are different. Our relationship with the Lord is a deeply personal one. As we relate to each other out of our uniqueness, so too we relate to the Lord out of our unique personality and history. Even when we are praying together, as we do at Mass, reciting the same prayers together, we do so in a way that is personal to each one of us. The Lord respected the very different way that the two people approached him in the gospel reading and responded to each of them equally. The Lord respects us in our uniqueness. He recognized and rejoices in the personal nature of our faith. He calls us by name, respecting our individuality. The Christian faith is a communal faith; we journey together to the Lord who is always at work to form a community of believers. Yet, that communal nature of our faith never eradicates what is unique to each of us. As Paul recognized very clear, the church is a unity in diversity, like a human body.

And/Or

(vi) Monday, Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

In the gospel reading this morning, two people approach Jesus for healing. One of them, a synagogue official, asks Jesus to come and touch his daughter who has just died, laying his hands on her. The other, a woman with a flow of blood, comes to touch Jesus for herself. Indeed, she limits herself to touching the fringe of his cloak. Both the official and the woman recognize the healing power of touching Jesus or being touched by Jesus. The woman was able to come and touch Jesus for herself. The daughter of the official could not come to Jesus because she had died, and, so, her father came to Jesus on her behalf and asked him to come and touch her. Both of these people, the official and the woman, speak of the two ways that we ourselves often approach Jesus. Like the woman, we often come before him in our own need, seeking to touch the Lord in faith, in our prayer. Like the official, we sometimes come before the Lord in prayer, interceding with him for others, asking him to come into the life of someone who is dear to us. Both forms of prayer, the prayer for our own needs and the prayer for others, are expressions of our faith in the life-giving touch of Jesus. Whether we come before the Lord in the guise of the official or in the guise of the woman, we will be opening up ourselves and those for whom we pray to the Lord’s life-giving and healing presence.

Fr. Martin Hogan, Saint John the Baptist Parish, Clontarf, Dublin, D03 AO62, Ireland.

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The child abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad – BBC News

Image caption Buildings at Bindoon were constructed by migrant children

For several decades, the UK sent children across the world to new lives in institutions where many were abused and used as forced labour. It’s a scandal that is still having repercussions now.

Imagine the 1950s, in the years before air travel became commonplace or the internet dominated our lives. Imagine being a child of those times, barely aware of life even in the next town. An orphan perhaps, living in an British children’s home.

Now imagine being told that shortly you would board a ship for somewhere called Australia, to begin a new life in a sunlit wonderland. For good. No choice.

It happened to thousands of British children in the decades immediately following World War Two, and they had little understanding of how it would shape their lives.

The astonishing scandal of the British child migrants will be the first subject for which the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse will hold full public hearings. It’s first because the migrants are now nearing the end of their lives.

Clifford Walsh stands in the port of Fremantle near Perth in Western Australia.

He is now 72. Fremantle is where, in 1954, aged nine, he stepped off the ship from London, looking for the sheep he’d been told outnumbered people in Australia 100 to one.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He ended up at a place called Bindoon.

The Catholic institution known at one point as Bindoon Boys Town is now notorious. Based around an imposing stone mansion in the Australian countryside, 49 miles north of Perth, are buildings Walsh and his fellow child migrants were forced to build, barefoot, starting work the day after they arrived.

The Christian Brothers ruled the place with the aim of upholding order and a moral code. Within two days of arriving he says he received his first punishment at the hands of one of the brothers.

“He punched us, he kicked us, smashed us in the face, back-handed us and everything, and he then sat us on his knee to tell us that he doesn’t like to hurt children, but we had been bad boys.

“I was sobbing uncontrollably for hours.”

His story is deeply distressing. He tells it with a particularly Australian directness. He is furious.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A teacher reads to a group of children in Stevenage who are about to be sent to the Fairbridge school in Molong

He describes one brother luring him into his room with the promise he could have some sweet molasses – normally fed, not to the boys, but the cows. The man sexually abused him.

He claims another brother raped him, and and a third beat him mercilessly after falsely accusing him of having sex with another boy.

“We had no parents, we had no relatives, there was nowhere we could go, these brothers – these paedophiles – must have thought they were in hog heaven.”

He has accused the brothers at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the first time he has fully disclosed his experiences.

At the time he says: “I was too terrified to report the abuse. I knew no other life.

“I’ve lived 60 odd years with this hate, I can’t have a normal sexual relationship because I don’t like to hold people,” says Walsh. “My own wife, I couldn’t hug.”

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He was troubled by all the memories.

“I couldn’t show any affection. Stuff like that only reminded me of what the brothers would do all the time.”

Britain is perhaps the only country in the world to have exported vast numbers of its children. An estimated 150,000 children were sent over a 350-year period to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and what was then Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.

Australia was the main destination in the final wave between 1945 and 1974.

There were twin purposes – to ease the population of orphanages in the UK and to boost the population of the colonies.

The children were recruited by religious institutions from both the Anglican and Catholic churches, or well-meaning charities including Barnardo’s and the Fairbridge Society. Their motivation was to give “lost” children a new life, and it would be wrong to say that every one of Britain’s exported children suffered.

But for too many, the dream became a nightmare. Hundreds of migrant children have given accounts of poor education, hard labour, physical beatings and sexual abuse.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A demonstration of boxing at the Fairbridge school in Pinjarra, Western Australia

Attempts were made to recreate a happy home life. At the Fairbridge Farm School in Molong, four hours outside Sydney, children lived in cottages, each with a “house mother”.

Fairbridge was not a religious order, like the Christian Brothers, and some of its former children have praised the start it gave them.

But not Derek Moriarty. He was at Molong for eight years, one of hundreds of children to have endured poor food, inadequate education and physical labour. His life has been deeply affected by his Fairbridge upbringing.

He suffered at the hands of the then-principal of the school, Frederick Woods, a man he says kept 10 canes, and to the horror of the children, a hockey stick – which he used to beat the boys.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Boys play football at the Fairbridge school at Pinjarra

Perhaps inevitably, Moriarty alleges sexual abuse – by a member of staff who took his clothes off and touched him.

“I was nine or 10,” he says, “and I didn’t understand it.” He eventually ran away from Molong, attempted suicide at the age of 18 and has always suffered from depression, not helped by the years it took to discover the details of his family back in the UK.

In 2009 the Australian government apologised for the cruelty shown to the child migrants. Britain also made an apology in 2010.

The pressure for answers and reparations had been growing. Questions might never have been asked, had it not been for two seekers of the truth.

In the early 1980s a Nottingham social worker, Margaret Humphreys, came across Australian former migrants who had suddenly started to realise they might have living relatives in the UK.

Many had been told, as children, their parents were dead. It wasn’t true. “It was about identity,” she says, “being stripped of it and being robbed of it.”

Her life’s work has been about reuniting “lost children” with their lost relatives. Having reinstated their sense of identity, she went on to build a lifelong bond with many former migrants, and they began to disclose the physical and sexual abuse they had suffered.

“As you go along, you’re learning more and more about the degrees and the awfulness of the abuse. That’s been incremental because people can really only talk about it over a longer period of time when there is trust. There’s a lot of trauma involved here.”

Image caption David Hill sailed out of Tilbury bound for a Fairbridge farm school

Further revelations about the Fairbridge homes were uncovered by one of their own.

David Hill was shipped out from Britain with his brothers to the Fairbridge farm at Molong in 1959. He was one of the lucky ones. His mother followed him later, providing him with a stable future.

He became a highly successful public figure in Australia. He was chairman and managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and is a keen historian. Hill brought together the Fairbridge boys and girls to tell him their stories. Like those from the west of Australia – they were dominated by beatings and abuse.

Derek Moriarty was among those who unburdened themselves for the first time to Hill, as part of the research for his 2007 book The Forgotten Children and a 2009 ABC television documentary.

“I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders when I told him,” Moriarty says. “But my abuse paled into insignificance compared to some others.”

David Hill’s work triggered claim after claim from men and women about their experiences as children.

Image copyright Other

Image caption Children gather at the Fairbridge school at Molong

They wrote and told him of a litany of sexual abuse. There was no sexual education at the school and, failing to understand what was happening, they were left traumatised.

Hill makes the astonishing claim that 60% of the children at Fairbridge Molong allege they were sexually abused, based on more than 100 interviews.

The Australian law firm Slater and Gordon successfully claimed compensation on behalf of 215 former Fairbridge children, of whom 129 said they had been sexually abused.

For the Christian Brothers the figures are even higher. The Australian Royal Commission on child abuse recently revealed 853 people had accused members of the order.

Hill is one of the expert witnesses who will give evidence to the UK Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). The inquiry has been bitterly criticised since its creation – and some have questioned its huge scope.

Is there any point in it considering the history of child migration, dating back so far?

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Children at Pinjarra hear a speech by the Duke of Gloucester

The Australian Royal commission is examining child migration closely. In 1998 the UK’s Health Select Committee also held hearings, in which the Child Migrants Trust described the Christian Brothers institutions as “almost the full realisation of a paedophile’s dream”.

But the committee did not get to the bottom of it, concluding: “The Christian Brothers were very insistent that the abuses were not known to those who controlled these institutions. We cannot accept this.”

Sources close to the current public inquiry have told the BBC it will produce new and startling revelations about the scale of sexual abuse abroad, and attempts by British and Australian institutions to cover it up.

This will include an examination of the claims of some child migrants that they were sent abroad weeks after reporting sexual abuse at their children’s home in the UK. The allegation is that they were hand-picked. Either to get them out of the way, or because they were of interest to paedophiles.

Three former Fairbridge boys have claimed that the then-Australian Governor General, Lord Slim, sexually molested them during rides in his chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce while visiting the home. It is understood these allegations could be considered by the inquiry.

The inquiry could also definitively answer a crucial historical question. Did the British government know it was sending children to be mistreated in a foreign country?

Margaret Humphreys is adamant: “We want to know what happened, we want to know who did it, and we want to know who covered it up for so long.”

In fact, government files reveal that there was a time when the migration programme could have been stopped. It came in 1956 when three officials went to Australia to inspect 26 institutions which took child migrants.

Image copyright National Archives

There was enough warning of this “fact-finding mission” to allow a Fairbridge official to warn the manager of the Molong farm: “It would be advisable to see (the children) wore their socks and shoes.” Even in a land where it was easy to encounter poisonous wildlife, that wasn’t standard practice at many of the institutions.

The resulting report, delivered back to the British government, was fairly critical. It identified a general lack of expertise in child care and worried that children were living in institutions in remote rural areas, whereas the trend in Britain was towards fostering them into urban families.

However the report had a second “secret” section, never published, which went a little further.

This named names – including those of five institutions which were not up to standard. When the UK’s Home Office saw the report, it wanted five more added to create what became an infamous blacklist – places which should not receive more children because of poor standards of care. Fairbridge Molong and Bindoon were both on the list.

St Joseph’s orphanage, Sydney

Dhurringile Rural Training Farm, Victoria

St Joseph’s, Neerkol, nr Rockhampton, Queensland

Salvation Army Training Farm, Riverview, Queensland

Methodist Home, Magill, Adelaide

St Vincent’s Orphanage, Castledare

St Joseph’s Farm School, Bindoon, Western Australia

St John Bosco Boys’ Town, Glenorchy, Hobart

Fairbridge Farm School, Pinjarra, Western Australia

Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, New South Wales

But the report had barely scratched the surface. It made no mention of sexual or physical abuse.

Given the length of time it took for the child migrants to tell their stories, this is perhaps unsurprising.

But during the post-war years, sexual accusations were made against three principals of the Fairbridge Farm School at Molong.

David Hill has revealed they included a claim that Frederick Woods – the man who beat boys with a hockey stick – was “sexually perverted” and had abused a girl resident. An internal investigation exonerated him.

This does not appear to have been disclosed by the Fairbridge Society either to the public or the 1956 inspectors. They had a schedule to keep to, and their visits to institutions spread across a vast country were fleeting.

Image copyright EPA

Image caption Like the UK, there has been outrage in Australia over historical child abuse

Similarly, at the Christian Brothers’ homes in Western Australia, children were terrified of criticising the brothers.

Former Bindoon resident Clifford Walsh was there during the fact-finding mission. He doesn’t remember it, but says speaking out would have resulted in an extremely severe, possibly even life-threatening, beating.

The truth is that neither the institutions, nor the inspectors, came close to creating the sort of atmosphere where children could tell them their darkest secrets and be taken seriously. If that had happened, not just in Australia, but throughout modern British history, we might not have needed the current public inquiry.

It might have missed the crimes being committed in the institutions, but when the 1956 report hit the desks of Britain’s bureaucrats it created quite a stir.

Something strongly resembling a cover-up began. Files held at the National Archive set out the response of government officials. One wrote in 1957 that the Overseas Migration Board, which advised the government, was “sorry the mission was sent at all”.

Image copyright PA

Image caption After a series of changes at the top, Alexis Jay is now the head of the British inquiry

Some on the board “urged very strongly that the report should not be published.”

The government archives record that at a meeting with the organisations running the migrant programmes, Lord John Hope, under-secretary of state for Commonwealth relations, discussed what would be disclosed to parliament from the report.

“I think you can rely upon us to do what we can in as much as we shall pick out all the good bits,” he said. “I shall not be in the least critical in Parliament.”

The UK Fairbridge Society piled on its own pressure – its president was the Duke of Gloucester, uncle to the Queen. Officials discussed the “immediate parliamentary repercussions” which could result from holding up the migrant programme.

Sir Colin Anderson, the director of the Orient Line, which benefited from the business of shipping the children, appealed for the report not to be made public because of the controversy it might cause.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

The inquiry into historical child sex abuse in England and Wales is to examine claims made against local authorities, religious organisations, the armed forces and public and private institutions

Momentum for the inquiry started with the Jimmy Savile scandal

The inquiry is expected to take about five years to complete

The first phase of the inquiry will consist of 13 separate investigations

The child sexual abuse inquiry so far

In a sympathetic phone call, a senior official from the Overseas Migration Board responded that the Fairbridge Society was an “extremely fine endeavour for which everyone felt the highest praise”.

And what did the government do? Files at the National Archive show officials squirmed in institutional discomfort at the idea of taking any meaningful action.

In June 1957 the Commonwealth Relations Office sent a secret telegram to the UK High Commission in Australia – “we do not want to withhold approval”, it said, for more children to to be sent from the UK.

After more pressure from the Fairbridge Society, 16 children waiting to travel were sent on their way.

The key recommendation of the inspectors, that the British home secretary agree each and every decision to send a child, was quietly shelved.

The Fairbridge Society continued to ship out children, though concentrated on those whose mothers intended to join them later.

David Hill’s response is anger, even today. With tears in his eyes he says: “I’m surprised how vulnerable it has made me feel – that it could happen and happen to the extent that it did.

“The British government not only continued to approve children to be sent, but they financially subsidised for them to go. To institutions they had put on a blacklist unfit for children, condemned.”

Molong Farm School finally closed in 1973. The Fairbridge Society is now part of the Prince’s Trust and still runs activity holidays for children.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

The Prince’s Trust said it had never been involved in child migration, “but we do hold the archive of the former Fairbridge Society. We are cooperating fully with this important inquiry.”

Bindoon remained open until 1966. It is now used as a Catholic college.

The Australian Royal Commission recently estimated that 7% of the country’s Catholic priests were involved in child abuse.

And such is the scope of sexual abuse allegations in the Catholic and Anglican churches in the UK that entire strands of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse are dedicated to them.

The IICSA investigation will be able to seize the records, not just of the British government but also the migration institutions themselves – including the archives of the Fairbridge society.

Sixty years later, former Bindoon boy Clifford Walsh strongly believes this inquiry can help answer some of his questions about the culpability of the government and British institutions.

“They sent us to a place that was a living hell. How come they didn’t know that? Why didn’t they investigate? And if they investigated, then they were incompetent or there was a cover-up.”

The child migration programme will also provide ample evidence for the UK’s effort to consider the long-term effect of child sexual abuse. Something which may turn out to be a central theme of the inquiry.

Historian and Fairbridge boy David Hill estimates it took victims he interviewed 22 years on average before they felt able to disclose what happened.

But it will also provide a final chance for Britain’s lost children to return to the land of their birth and tell their stories. The anger has not gone away, and their childhoods have left invisible scars which have lasted a lifetime.

One of the child migrants we spoke to asked us not to name him, after he returned to Bindoon armed with a sledgehammer.

His target? The ostentatious burial place of Brother Paul Keaney the institution’s founder. By the time he’d finished, enough damage had been done to the marble grave slab that Bindoon’s current owners, a Catholic college, were forced to remove what remained.

It was one man’s small blow against a history of child cruelty.

Have you been affected by abuse?

The Child Migrants Trust attempts to reunite children sent abroad with their families

NSPCC specialises in child protection

National Association for People Abused in Childhood offers support, advice and guidance to adult survivors of any form of childhood abuse

Survivor Scotland offers help to improve the lives of survivors of childhood abuse in Scotland

Childline is a private and confidential service for children and young people up to the age of 19

The Children’s Society works to support vulnerable children in England and Wales

Stop It Now! supports adults worried about child abuse, including survivors, professionals, those with a concern about their own thoughts or behaviour towards children and friends and relatives of people arrested for sexual offending

Read more: http://ift.tt/2lS5XSp

from The child abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad – BBC News

Image caption Buildings at Bindoon were constructed by migrant children

For several decades, the UK sent children across the world to new lives in institutions where many were abused and used as forced labour. It’s a scandal that is still having repercussions now.

Imagine the 1950s, in the years before air travel became commonplace or the internet dominated our lives. Imagine being a child of those times, barely aware of life even in the next town. An orphan perhaps, living in an British children’s home.

Now imagine being told that shortly you would board a ship for somewhere called Australia, to begin a new life in a sunlit wonderland. For good. No choice.

It happened to thousands of British children in the decades immediately following World War Two, and they had little understanding of how it would shape their lives.

The astonishing scandal of the British child migrants will be the first subject for which the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse will hold full public hearings. It’s first because the migrants are now nearing the end of their lives.

Clifford Walsh stands in the port of Fremantle near Perth in Western Australia.

He is now 72. Fremantle is where, in 1954, aged nine, he stepped off the ship from London, looking for the sheep he’d been told outnumbered people in Australia 100 to one.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He ended up at a place called Bindoon.

The Catholic institution known at one point as Bindoon Boys Town is now notorious. Based around an imposing stone mansion in the Australian countryside, 49 miles north of Perth, are buildings Walsh and his fellow child migrants were forced to build, barefoot, starting work the day after they arrived.

The Christian Brothers ruled the place with the aim of upholding order and a moral code. Within two days of arriving he says he received his first punishment at the hands of one of the brothers.

“He punched us, he kicked us, smashed us in the face, back-handed us and everything, and he then sat us on his knee to tell us that he doesn’t like to hurt children, but we had been bad boys.

“I was sobbing uncontrollably for hours.”

His story is deeply distressing. He tells it with a particularly Australian directness. He is furious.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A teacher reads to a group of children in Stevenage who are about to be sent to the Fairbridge school in Molong

He describes one brother luring him into his room with the promise he could have some sweet molasses – normally fed, not to the boys, but the cows. The man sexually abused him.

He claims another brother raped him, and and a third beat him mercilessly after falsely accusing him of having sex with another boy.

“We had no parents, we had no relatives, there was nowhere we could go, these brothers – these paedophiles – must have thought they were in hog heaven.”

He has accused the brothers at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the first time he has fully disclosed his experiences.

At the time he says: “I was too terrified to report the abuse. I knew no other life.

“I’ve lived 60 odd years with this hate, I can’t have a normal sexual relationship because I don’t like to hold people,” says Walsh. “My own wife, I couldn’t hug.”

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

He was troubled by all the memories.

“I couldn’t show any affection. Stuff like that only reminded me of what the brothers would do all the time.”

Britain is perhaps the only country in the world to have exported vast numbers of its children. An estimated 150,000 children were sent over a 350-year period to Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and what was then Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.

Australia was the main destination in the final wave between 1945 and 1974.

There were twin purposes – to ease the population of orphanages in the UK and to boost the population of the colonies.

The children were recruited by religious institutions from both the Anglican and Catholic churches, or well-meaning charities including Barnardo’s and the Fairbridge Society. Their motivation was to give “lost” children a new life, and it would be wrong to say that every one of Britain’s exported children suffered.

But for too many, the dream became a nightmare. Hundreds of migrant children have given accounts of poor education, hard labour, physical beatings and sexual abuse.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption A demonstration of boxing at the Fairbridge school in Pinjarra, Western Australia

Attempts were made to recreate a happy home life. At the Fairbridge Farm School in Molong, four hours outside Sydney, children lived in cottages, each with a “house mother”.

Fairbridge was not a religious order, like the Christian Brothers, and some of its former children have praised the start it gave them.

But not Derek Moriarty. He was at Molong for eight years, one of hundreds of children to have endured poor food, inadequate education and physical labour. His life has been deeply affected by his Fairbridge upbringing.

He suffered at the hands of the then-principal of the school, Frederick Woods, a man he says kept 10 canes, and to the horror of the children, a hockey stick – which he used to beat the boys.

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Boys play football at the Fairbridge school at Pinjarra

Perhaps inevitably, Moriarty alleges sexual abuse – by a member of staff who took his clothes off and touched him.

“I was nine or 10,” he says, “and I didn’t understand it.” He eventually ran away from Molong, attempted suicide at the age of 18 and has always suffered from depression, not helped by the years it took to discover the details of his family back in the UK.

In 2009 the Australian government apologised for the cruelty shown to the child migrants. Britain also made an apology in 2010.

The pressure for answers and reparations had been growing. Questions might never have been asked, had it not been for two seekers of the truth.

In the early 1980s a Nottingham social worker, Margaret Humphreys, came across Australian former migrants who had suddenly started to realise they might have living relatives in the UK.

Many had been told, as children, their parents were dead. It wasn’t true. “It was about identity,” she says, “being stripped of it and being robbed of it.”

Her life’s work has been about reuniting “lost children” with their lost relatives. Having reinstated their sense of identity, she went on to build a lifelong bond with many former migrants, and they began to disclose the physical and sexual abuse they had suffered.

“As you go along, you’re learning more and more about the degrees and the awfulness of the abuse. That’s been incremental because people can really only talk about it over a longer period of time when there is trust. There’s a lot of trauma involved here.”

Image caption David Hill sailed out of Tilbury bound for a Fairbridge farm school

Further revelations about the Fairbridge homes were uncovered by one of their own.

David Hill was shipped out from Britain with his brothers to the Fairbridge farm at Molong in 1959. He was one of the lucky ones. His mother followed him later, providing him with a stable future.

He became a highly successful public figure in Australia. He was chairman and managing director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and is a keen historian. Hill brought together the Fairbridge boys and girls to tell him their stories. Like those from the west of Australia – they were dominated by beatings and abuse.

Derek Moriarty was among those who unburdened themselves for the first time to Hill, as part of the research for his 2007 book The Forgotten Children and a 2009 ABC television documentary.

“I felt a weight lifted off my shoulders when I told him,” Moriarty says. “But my abuse paled into insignificance compared to some others.”

David Hill’s work triggered claim after claim from men and women about their experiences as children.

Image copyright Other

Image caption Children gather at the Fairbridge school at Molong

They wrote and told him of a litany of sexual abuse. There was no sexual education at the school and, failing to understand what was happening, they were left traumatised.

Hill makes the astonishing claim that 60% of the children at Fairbridge Molong allege they were sexually abused, based on more than 100 interviews.

The Australian law firm Slater and Gordon successfully claimed compensation on behalf of 215 former Fairbridge children, of whom 129 said they had been sexually abused.

For the Christian Brothers the figures are even higher. The Australian Royal Commission on child abuse recently revealed 853 people had accused members of the order.

Hill is one of the expert witnesses who will give evidence to the UK Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA). The inquiry has been bitterly criticised since its creation – and some have questioned its huge scope.

Is there any point in it considering the history of child migration, dating back so far?

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Children at Pinjarra hear a speech by the Duke of Gloucester

The Australian Royal commission is examining child migration closely. In 1998 the UK’s Health Select Committee also held hearings, in which the Child Migrants Trust described the Christian Brothers institutions as “almost the full realisation of a paedophile’s dream”.

But the committee did not get to the bottom of it, concluding: “The Christian Brothers were very insistent that the abuses were not known to those who controlled these institutions. We cannot accept this.”

Sources close to the current public inquiry have told the BBC it will produce new and startling revelations about the scale of sexual abuse abroad, and attempts by British and Australian institutions to cover it up.

This will include an examination of the claims of some child migrants that they were sent abroad weeks after reporting sexual abuse at their children’s home in the UK. The allegation is that they were hand-picked. Either to get them out of the way, or because they were of interest to paedophiles.

Three former Fairbridge boys have claimed that the then-Australian Governor General, Lord Slim, sexually molested them during rides in his chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce while visiting the home. It is understood these allegations could be considered by the inquiry.

The inquiry could also definitively answer a crucial historical question. Did the British government know it was sending children to be mistreated in a foreign country?

Margaret Humphreys is adamant: “We want to know what happened, we want to know who did it, and we want to know who covered it up for so long.”

In fact, government files reveal that there was a time when the migration programme could have been stopped. It came in 1956 when three officials went to Australia to inspect 26 institutions which took child migrants.

Image copyright National Archives

There was enough warning of this “fact-finding mission” to allow a Fairbridge official to warn the manager of the Molong farm: “It would be advisable to see (the children) wore their socks and shoes.” Even in a land where it was easy to encounter poisonous wildlife, that wasn’t standard practice at many of the institutions.

The resulting report, delivered back to the British government, was fairly critical. It identified a general lack of expertise in child care and worried that children were living in institutions in remote rural areas, whereas the trend in Britain was towards fostering them into urban families.

However the report had a second “secret” section, never published, which went a little further.

This named names – including those of five institutions which were not up to standard. When the UK’s Home Office saw the report, it wanted five more added to create what became an infamous blacklist – places which should not receive more children because of poor standards of care. Fairbridge Molong and Bindoon were both on the list.

St Joseph’s orphanage, Sydney

Dhurringile Rural Training Farm, Victoria

St Joseph’s, Neerkol, nr Rockhampton, Queensland

Salvation Army Training Farm, Riverview, Queensland

Methodist Home, Magill, Adelaide

St Vincent’s Orphanage, Castledare

St Joseph’s Farm School, Bindoon, Western Australia

St John Bosco Boys’ Town, Glenorchy, Hobart

Fairbridge Farm School, Pinjarra, Western Australia

Fairbridge Farm School, Molong, New South Wales

But the report had barely scratched the surface. It made no mention of sexual or physical abuse.

Given the length of time it took for the child migrants to tell their stories, this is perhaps unsurprising.

But during the post-war years, sexual accusations were made against three principals of the Fairbridge Farm School at Molong.

David Hill has revealed they included a claim that Frederick Woods – the man who beat boys with a hockey stick – was “sexually perverted” and had abused a girl resident. An internal investigation exonerated him.

This does not appear to have been disclosed by the Fairbridge Society either to the public or the 1956 inspectors. They had a schedule to keep to, and their visits to institutions spread across a vast country were fleeting.

Image copyright EPA

Image caption Like the UK, there has been outrage in Australia over historical child abuse

Similarly, at the Christian Brothers’ homes in Western Australia, children were terrified of criticising the brothers.

Former Bindoon resident Clifford Walsh was there during the fact-finding mission. He doesn’t remember it, but says speaking out would have resulted in an extremely severe, possibly even life-threatening, beating.

The truth is that neither the institutions, nor the inspectors, came close to creating the sort of atmosphere where children could tell them their darkest secrets and be taken seriously. If that had happened, not just in Australia, but throughout modern British history, we might not have needed the current public inquiry.

It might have missed the crimes being committed in the institutions, but when the 1956 report hit the desks of Britain’s bureaucrats it created quite a stir.

Something strongly resembling a cover-up began. Files held at the National Archive set out the response of government officials. One wrote in 1957 that the Overseas Migration Board, which advised the government, was “sorry the mission was sent at all”.

Image copyright PA

Image caption After a series of changes at the top, Alexis Jay is now the head of the British inquiry

Some on the board “urged very strongly that the report should not be published.”

The government archives record that at a meeting with the organisations running the migrant programmes, Lord John Hope, under-secretary of state for Commonwealth relations, discussed what would be disclosed to parliament from the report.

“I think you can rely upon us to do what we can in as much as we shall pick out all the good bits,” he said. “I shall not be in the least critical in Parliament.”

The UK Fairbridge Society piled on its own pressure – its president was the Duke of Gloucester, uncle to the Queen. Officials discussed the “immediate parliamentary repercussions” which could result from holding up the migrant programme.

Sir Colin Anderson, the director of the Orient Line, which benefited from the business of shipping the children, appealed for the report not to be made public because of the controversy it might cause.

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse

The inquiry into historical child sex abuse in England and Wales is to examine claims made against local authorities, religious organisations, the armed forces and public and private institutions

Momentum for the inquiry started with the Jimmy Savile scandal

The inquiry is expected to take about five years to complete

The first phase of the inquiry will consist of 13 separate investigations

The child sexual abuse inquiry so far

In a sympathetic phone call, a senior official from the Overseas Migration Board responded that the Fairbridge Society was an “extremely fine endeavour for which everyone felt the highest praise”.

And what did the government do? Files at the National Archive show officials squirmed in institutional discomfort at the idea of taking any meaningful action.

In June 1957 the Commonwealth Relations Office sent a secret telegram to the UK High Commission in Australia – “we do not want to withhold approval”, it said, for more children to to be sent from the UK.

After more pressure from the Fairbridge Society, 16 children waiting to travel were sent on their way.

The key recommendation of the inspectors, that the British home secretary agree each and every decision to send a child, was quietly shelved.

The Fairbridge Society continued to ship out children, though concentrated on those whose mothers intended to join them later.

David Hill’s response is anger, even today. With tears in his eyes he says: “I’m surprised how vulnerable it has made me feel – that it could happen and happen to the extent that it did.

“The British government not only continued to approve children to be sent, but they financially subsidised for them to go. To institutions they had put on a blacklist unfit for children, condemned.”

Molong Farm School finally closed in 1973. The Fairbridge Society is now part of the Prince’s Trust and still runs activity holidays for children.

Image copyright Clifford Walsh

The Prince’s Trust said it had never been involved in child migration, “but we do hold the archive of the former Fairbridge Society. We are cooperating fully with this important inquiry.”

Bindoon remained open until 1966. It is now used as a Catholic college.

The Australian Royal Commission recently estimated that 7% of the country’s Catholic priests were involved in child abuse.

And such is the scope of sexual abuse allegations in the Catholic and Anglican churches in the UK that entire strands of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse are dedicated to them.

The IICSA investigation will be able to seize the records, not just of the British government but also the migration institutions themselves – including the archives of the Fairbridge society.

Sixty years later, former Bindoon boy Clifford Walsh strongly believes this inquiry can help answer some of his questions about the culpability of the government and British institutions.

“They sent us to a place that was a living hell. How come they didn’t know that? Why didn’t they investigate? And if they investigated, then they were incompetent or there was a cover-up.”

The child migration programme will also provide ample evidence for the UK’s effort to consider the long-term effect of child sexual abuse. Something which may turn out to be a central theme of the inquiry.

Historian and Fairbridge boy David Hill estimates it took victims he interviewed 22 years on average before they felt able to disclose what happened.

But it will also provide a final chance for Britain’s lost children to return to the land of their birth and tell their stories. The anger has not gone away, and their childhoods have left invisible scars which have lasted a lifetime.

One of the child migrants we spoke to asked us not to name him, after he returned to Bindoon armed with a sledgehammer.

His target? The ostentatious burial place of Brother Paul Keaney the institution’s founder. By the time he’d finished, enough damage had been done to the marble grave slab that Bindoon’s current owners, a Catholic college, were forced to remove what remained.

It was one man’s small blow against a history of child cruelty.

Have you been affected by abuse?

The Child Migrants Trust attempts to reunite children sent abroad with their families

NSPCC specialises in child protection

National Association for People Abused in Childhood offers support, advice and guidance to adult survivors of any form of childhood abuse

Survivor Scotland offers help to improve the lives of survivors of childhood abuse in Scotland

Childline is a private and confidential service for children and young people up to the age of 19

The Children’s Society works to support vulnerable children in England and Wales

Stop It Now! supports adults worried about child abuse, including survivors, professionals, those with a concern about their own thoughts or behaviour towards children and friends and relatives of people arrested for sexual offending

Read more: http://ift.tt/2lS5XSp

    The post The child abuse scandal of the British children sent abroad – BBC News appeared first on MavWrek Marketing by Jason

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Preface

This article is a departure from previous biographical pieces about the soldiers of the 18th Battalion because of the personal experiences of the author in the geographic area in which this story unfolds. Thus, it is more personal and subjective with the attendant personal observations and valuations of someone that has been there and has a familiarity with the area.

Special thanks to Steve Clifford for pointing me in the right direction for sources. His kindness in helping me is much appreciated and without this help this part of the 18th Battalion’s history would have remained uknown.

Background

Thanks to my parents and their generosity the privilege of boating and vacationing in the Georgian Bay area was part of the many wonderful life experiences I have experienced.

Overview of Georgian Bay. Midland, Ontario is approximately a 2 hour drive from Toronto, Ontario.

Georgian Bay is a large bay to the east of the main body of Lake Huron and is part of the Great Lakes system of lakes geographically located approximately 760 kilometers west of Quebec City and the gateway to the Atlantic Ocean Its 15,000 square kilometers of area include the rock of the Canadian Shield and one of the longest fresh water beaches in the world and has areas of marked demarcation between the deciduous forests of Southern Ontario.

The specific areas that I experienced and are related to the area in the south-eastern part of the Bay bounded by Christian Island to the west, the towns of Penetang to the south and Midland to the west, and Fryingpan Island to the north.

Typical view of Georgian Bay with its many islands adjacent to the mainland and then the open water of the large part of the Bay.

Georgian Bay is a place of beauty and history. The Western European involvement in this area began with the creation of a Jesuit Mission on the Wye River, east of current day Midland, Ontario, in 1639. The Mission of Sainte-Marie was established to minister to the indigenous Huron population and was to only last a decade when it was abandoned due to tribal conflict with the Iroquois. Its location at the base of Georgian Bay had strategic value to the French traders as their route to and from their base in Quebec City, and later, Montreal was important as the way the waterways, lakes and rivers co-joined to allow the movement of trade goods and furs between the interior of the Canadian wilderness to the mercantile center of the French Colonial presence in North America.

Then, as now, the Bay is not to be trifled with. It is a body of water with a beauty hard to describe to those not present as its geographic mix of the softwood forests of Southern Ontario demarcated with a line where the coniferous forests and the granite of the Canadian Shield begins. This is readily evident at Beausoleil Island (part of the Georgian Bay Islands National Park) where the south part of the island is covered with trees and grasses of the southern Ontario and climes and then, suddenly and dramatically, the land changes to the that of the Canadian Shield with its multi-coloured granite rock and denser collection of coniferous trees.

With this beauty comes an often-under-estimated danger. The waters of Georgian Bay are fraught with dangers. Shoals, hidden rocks, and other hazards to navigation abound and even in today’s world of GPS navigation and charts often seen at the marinas about the region are boats having their propellers and lower-end units repaired or replaced due to a moments inattention or a captain’s misjudgement during navigation or maneuvering. The Bay claims lives every year from these hazards and the sudden, changing weather of the Great Lakes Region.

Mixed nautical chart of area. Note the * symbols to the west and north of Giants Tomb Island. These are known underwater hazards (rock/tree stumps). There are many uncharted hazards.

It is in the context of a time before these sophisticated tools of navigation that our story ensues…

Lieutenant William Sinclair McClinton[i]

The starred makers are the main locations in this article.

William Sinclair McClinton was born in Elmvale, Ontario January 24, 1894 to a family deeply involved and embedded with social, religious, and political environment of the Elmvale and Midland area. Dr. McClinton’s father was Dr. J.B.H. McClinton and it from news numerous news articles from the Barrie Examiner and the Northern Advance from 1910 to 1940 both men were newsworthy for their contributions to the community. Dr. McClinton’s father was intimately involved with education, religion (especially the local Presbyterian ministry) while Dr. W.S. McClinton was known for his involvement with sports (baseball, golf, and hockey), medicine, and his military career.

Lt. McClinton was active in the local militia, with experience with the 35th and 48th Regiments and was a medical student (University of Toronto, class of 1917) when he enlisted with the 4th Battalion at Valcartier, Quebec on August 22, 1914. He was on strength with that unit until September 21, 1914. It is unclear from his service records but he is released from the 4th Battalion to be attached to the 35th Simcoe Foresters from January 18, 1915 to November 1915 and was shown on the 37th Battalion paylists. Lt. McClinton is mentioned in several articles while he is serving with the 37th Battalion. The Barrie Examiner edition dated February 25, 1915 lists him as being a member of the 3rd Contingent and then later, on April 1, 1915 Lt. McClinton went to Toronto, Ontario at Exhibition Park for a 10-day special course focusing on musketry.  His service record show him being attested Niagara Camp on June 19, 1915.

Embarking in Canada on November 27, 1915 Lt. McClinton trained until ordered to join the 18th Battalion on April 15, 1916 and he joined the Battalion in the field the very next day. He served with the 18th Battalion until he December 17, 1916 where he was tasked with returning to Canada to complete his medical studies.

During that time, Lt. McClinton distinguished himself during a trench raid on the night of July 26/27 as the “bombing officer” and from this action he earned the Military Cross:

For conspicuous gallantry in action. He led a bombing attack on an enemy trench with great courage and determination. He displayed great courage and determination throughout and set a splendid example.

Military Cross Citation. London Gazette. No. 29824. 14/11/16. Page 11079

From this front-line experience, Lt. McClinton transited back to Canada and was struck off strength with the C.E.F. January 9, 1917 to complete his four year medical studies eventually serving in the Canadian Army Medical Corp, District No. 2 (Toronto, Ontario). He was married to Clara Crawford in Toronto July 27, 1918[ii] and was demobilized in Ottawa on November 7, 1919.

In the 1920’s the now Doctor “Doc” McClinton attended to the practice of medicine and took to sport, especially baseball and hockey. From the social columns, Dr. and Mrs. Clinton lived first in Oro Station, just north-east of Barrie, Ontario and then took up residence in Midland some time prior to 1926.

On the last day of October in 1930, very late in the season, Dr. McClinton and two other men went out in a 24-foot motor launch to do some fishing. They left Penetang/Penetanguishine and traveled out of the deep, protective bay past Magazine Island, so named as it was used to store ammunition for the naval establishment there during the early 1800s, and once out of the bay they passed Whisky Island, so named as smugglers were purported to hide liquor on this island. The launch probably passed to the east side of the island and proceeded roughly north-north-east until they passed the southern tip of Beausoleil Island and turned west. By the time the were even with Sawlog Bay the waves would have increased in height as the prevailing westerly winds have a clear reach between Giants Tomb Island lying north of the mainland. The wave would have whitecaps and a wave length and amplitude would determine how much water they

Giants Tomb Island taken from north, looking south.

shipped. It is most likely that they passed to the south of Giants Tomb Island[iii] unless on of the party had superior knowledge of the waters to the north of the island as the water is shallower and there are hidden shoals and other hazards. Once past the southern tip of Giants Tomb their boat would turn right and head north to The Watches, a set of rock outcrops approximately 4.5 miles north-west of the northern tip of Giants Tomb. This was their final destination as they planned to fish in the shoals of The Watches.

The fishing party left Penetang and headed to The Watches, two islands surrounded by shoals north-west of Giants Tomb Island. This is their estimated route as the area north of Giants Tomb has many more hazards to navigation.

The party fished and was successful catching some fish. They lunched but, as apt to occur anytime of the year, the weather changed and out in that exposed area their concern for their safety motivated them to start the return journey back to Penetanguishine. From their previous route, they now had ten miles of exposed navigating with, mostly likely, a following sea which can make the handling and the motion of a vessel very unpredictable.

It was during this return trip the Dr. McClinton disappeared and drowned.

The news story outlines the testimony of the other men of the party and it brings up several questions. They relate that they realized that Dr. McClinton was missing and that, “As he did not return his companions went aft to see what was keeping him, but his cap floating some distance behind…” Later in the news article A.L. Fitzgerald estimates that up to 5 minutes may have passed before his companion, Sheppard, noticed Dr. McClinton missing.

This is a curious statement. The men relate that they realized that Dr. McClinton was missing and that at some time, not clearly determined in the news article, they saw his cap floating in the water. They also admit that up to 5 minutes may have elapsed from the time that Dr. McClinton went aft to see after the fish and him going overboard.

The reason for concern in regards to this information is based on several factors. Assuming a speed of ten miles-per-hour on the return trip their boat would have traveled approximately 8/10ths of a mile (4,399 feet/1341 meters). Turning the launch about and attempting to retrace its path precisely is impossible at that time. There were not precise aids to navigate a return heading and with the waves and distances between landmarks, coupled with other barriers to visibility (the precise state of the weather conditions is unknown) would have made it a near miracle to discover a hat floating on the water. Even finding something lying on the surface under such conditions is near impossible. The article does not state if Fitzgerald and Sheppard retrieved the hat. It would be interesting to know if they did.

Time would have been of the essence. The waters of the Bay at that time are typically 8.7 degrees Celsius and can be as low as 4.2 degrees Celsius. Even at the higher of the two temperatures hypothermia can lead to exhaustion or unconsciousness in 30 to 60 minutes and with an expected survival time of one to three hours.[iv] Given the sea state and winds, coupled with the imprecise return route finding it is unlikely that Ferguson or Sheppard would have found Dr. McClinton, assuming he was still swimming or floating on the surface. As the article makes no mention of Dr. McClinton wearing any manner of personal flotation device and given the era of the accident the likelihood that he was wearing a life jacket is negligible. The men searched for Dr. McClinton for “45 minutes” where they called off their search. It is not clear why they did so but a statement later in the article indicates that the weather got so bad that, “It was considered unsafe for launches to venture beyond the gap on Friday afternoon or night…” The authorities considered the weather so bad that they secured a 36-foot launch, and later the Canadian Coast Guard tug, The Murray Stewart[v], with an overall length of 119 feet was considered necessary given the state of the water.

The Canadian Coast Guard Tug “Murray Stewart”. Built in 1918 at Port Arthur Shipbuilding she was 119 feet long with a beam of 26 feet and a draft of 16 feet. Weighing 234 tons she was propelled by a 156 NHP steam triple expansion engine. She served with the RCN 1939 – 46 and was scrapped 1967.

The Georgian Queen was converted from the Murray Stewart and her superstructure was highly modified. She was used for tours on Georgian Bay and was based in Penetang.

It is in this context that the tragedy of Lieutenant McClinton is very real to me. Having navigated the waters he did and had been out on Georgian Bay in a 24-foot-boat solo as late in the season as our Canadian Thanksgiving. If someone has swum in relatively shallow waters off Giant’s Tomb during a Victoria Weekend in May and feeling just how cold the water was then one’s imagination can extrapolate how cold the water would have been that Canadian Thanksgiving as I navigated our 24-foot power boat from Penetang to Twelve Mile Bay. It is not hard to imagine how long one would have survived if they had fallen overboard.

The weather is remarkably changeable in this region. It can be benign and balmy and then convective heating in the summer results in thunderheads and then storms and the winds can become up to hurricane force in very little time. The fishing party experienced such a change and even in a twenty-four-foot boat decided that the better part of valour necessitated a return to safer waters. It is impossible to determine the sea-state at the time of the accident and one has to imagine the breaking of the white-caps and the unpredictability of waves created by a sudden increase in wind velocity. The boat was probably pitching fore and aft; side to side, and off the beam making it hard to move about the boat and a sudden unexpected pitching motion from an unexpected quarter could have led to the demise of Lieutenant McClinton.

The weather quickly became so bad that the search party was called off and they waited for the arrival of larger boats to search and recover the body. There was even an attempt to use a boat with portholes in the hull and dynamite[vi] to raise the body and the search went on for ten days after the disappearance of Dr. McClinton, with no result.[vii]

This tragedy is representative of the dangers of Georgian Bay and is a sad end to a valiant and popular soldier and citizen. The tragedy was further deepened with no body being recovered and eventually the efforts for finding the deceased ended as the time from the accident increased and the approach of winter weather and freeze-up would prevent any further recovery efforts.

To add further to the pain of the family Dr. McClinton’s body was recovered off Fryingpan Island, approximately 14 miles from the Watches, though he probably fell overboard south of The Watches. This discovery instigated Mr. Sheppard, one of the party in the boat during the fishing trip, proceeding to the area with an Officer Wright from Midland to identify the body. After the confirmation of the body’s identity the family had a private service at their home and Dr. McClinton’s body was interned at the Quaker Hill Cemetery in Uxbridge, Ontario.

When researching the soldiers of the 18th Battalion there are times that the events and places these men experience and lived are far away. There is not point of reference as I am not a person of the early 20th Century in Canada. Dr. McClinton’s story is very tangible and accessible. I have shipped water during a very windy day with the sea state such that the incorrect loading of the vessel I was piloting had the potential of causing problems with water broaching into the cabin and damaging the engine. Our boat cruised out to Hope Island and no further into the open portion of Georgian Bay proper as a precaution in case the weather changed. The weather has changed to a blowing gale lifting furniture and throwing it meters from where it was and having to set out to the dock during this storm to assess and secure our boat so it did not break free.

Georgian Bay has a beauty all its own. It is not, necessarily, any more beautiful than other rough, remote areas of the world but it does express through its power in the weather the harsh fact that even though you may be only 10 miles from a town of a reasonable size and facilities there is no one there that can help you fast enough if you encounter trouble. Dr. McClinton and his compatriots did not have the benefit of two-way radio, global positioning systems, and other technologies but note that even with these technologies the Bay is no a forgiving Mistress. If the weather is bad that technology makes our inadequacy against nature more noticeable.

Dr. McClinton passes into history. He led a vibrant life. Active in local sports, community and military life he joined the 1st Contingent in a bid to go “over there” but his previous military experience and education slated him to become an officer. He served with distinction and survived the trenches and was transferred to the C.A.M.C. so he could use his medical skills in Canada. His family’s stature and activities in community and religious life was marked by numerous article and updates in the Barrie, Ontario newspapers.

The Northern Advance. August 8 1918. Page 8.

Married for twelve years it appears that Dr. McClinton and Clara McClinton had no children and this only serves to make the drowning of Dr. McClinton more tragic.

[i] A note on sources. Thanks to Steve Clifford (Twitter at @jake_a_loo and his very, very good web site at https://militaryandfamilyhistory.blog ) for referring the author to www. http://search.ourontario.ca for news articles pertaining to the McClintons. From one article Steve referred me to a plethora of interesting and illuminating news articles spanning the life of Dr. McClinton allowed me to get a better picture of the man and the times in which he lived. The Barrie Library has a key word searchable database for newspapers and the articles can be saved in PDF electronic format for future reference.

[ii] Northern Advance. August 8, 1918. Page 9.

[iii] Source of photo: http://www.claustro.ca/blog/243/western-islands-georgian-bay-with-bp-flight-out-of-huronia-airport

[iv] Source: http://www.pfdma.org/choosing/hypothermia.aspx

[v] Source: http://www.ccg-gcc.gc.ca/eng/CCG/USQUE_Ship_Details#101

[vi] The use of dynamite to recover bodies was used in the 1800s to approximately 1950s. See Means to recover Ottawa County native’s body is explosive for more information.

[vii] Dynamite Fails to Raise Doctor’s Body. Via the Midland Free Press from the Barrie Examiner Page 3. The date at the source indicates November 27, 1930. This date may be correct but is almost a month after the drowning.

Transcriptions and Images of News Articles

MIDLAND M.D. FALLING OFF BOAT, DROWNS Dr. William S. McClinton Meets Death on Fishing Trip ACCIDENT NOT SEEN Two Companions Busy in Front of Launch Fail to Notice.

William S. McClinton, Midland well known physician, sportsman and military man, met death by drowning last Friday while on a fishing trip on the Georgian Bay.

Leaving Penetang at 9.30 on Friday morning in a 24-foot launch, Dr. McClinton, with A.L. Fitzgerald and T.C. Sheppard, of Penetang, proceeded to the shoals near the Watches about 13 miles from Midland and 6 miles north-west of Giant’s Tomb. The reached the fishing grounds safely where they had some good sport. After they had their lunch the weather became heavy and they decided to turn back. Hardly had they started on their homeward trip when Dr. McClinton left his friends in the cabin to see that their catch, near the back of the boat was safe. As he did not return his companions went aft to see what was keeping him, but his cap floating some distance behind, told its own story of the disaster. The launch was turned about at once, but no human being could live more than a few minutes in the icy waters and no trace of him could be found though his companions cruised about for 45 minutes.

“On the way home I was steering the boat,” said A.L. Fitzgerald. “McClinton had just eaten his lunch and was sitting somewhere beside Sheppard, then he went back.”

“The roar of the engines and the continual splash of the wave would make it impossible to hear a call or splash of anyone falling overboard. When McClinton went back, Sheppard saw him. I didn’t see him go. There was no yell or sound. Between the time he went overboard and the time we missed him may have been five minutes. I’ve no way of telling.

“When Sheppard yelled that McClinton had gone I was stunned frozen at the wheel.”

It was considered unsafe for launches to venture beyond the gap on Friday afternoon or night, and no provision is made for securing tugs to meet conditions of this nature, no boats were sent out until Saturday when a 36-foot launch was despatched, carrying Provincial Officer Harry Wright and others, and another boat left Penetang. The body has not yet been recovered.

Dr. W.S. McClinton, only son of Dr. and Mrs. J.B.H. McClinton, was born at Elmvale. He served with distinction in the Great War and on returning from overseas went into practice in Midland with his father. Keenly interested in sports, he excelled in various games. When a student in Toronto he was one of the best amateur boxers in Ontario. His last visit to Barrie was a few weeks ago when he acted as referee for the boxing bouts in the armouries. Some years ago he was pitcher for the Midland baseball team and was also a hockeyist. He was a member of the Midland Golf Club and was a keen hunter and fisherman. Dr. McClinton had many friends and to them his death came as a great shock.

Some years ago he married Miss Clara Crawford, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. George Crawford of Oro Station who survives him. They had no family.

Source: The Barrie Examiner. November 6, 1930. Page 1. Found by Steve Clifford via Twitter @jake_a_loo .

Dynamite Fails to Raise Doctor’s Body. (Midland Free Press)

Efforts to location the body of the late Dr. W.S. McClinton, who drowned off The Watches, on Friday, October 31, are being continued every day when the weather will allow boats to operate on the shoals of that area.

Last Saturday the Government boat, “Murray Street,” went out to assist the searchers and during that day about thirty charges of dynamite were exploded but without producing any results. The boat returned to the scene on Monday.

Men and boats are continually on the look out at The Watches and patrol the area every day weather permits and will remain there for another ten days in the hope of recovering the body.

Every know means has been used in finding a boat with glass port holes in the bottom, but without results.

Source: Barrie Examiner. November 27, 1930. Page 3. (Note that this article appears almost one month after the drowning. It is unknown why it was published this date.)

BODY OF MIDLAND DOCTOR IS FOUND Dr. W. McClinton Drowned October 31st, Found on Thursday Last

Over nine months after he had been drowned in Georgian Bay, the body of Dr. W.S. McClinton was found on Thursday last on the shore of a small island, near Copperhead, 15 miles north of where the drowning occurred. A resident of Frying Pan Island, Mr. McNamara, found the remains floating on the shore on one of the smaller islands in the vicinity and notified the Provincial Police in Parry Sound, who in turn communicated with Officer Wright, at Midland. On Friday morning Mr. T. Sheppard, Penetang, left by boat and identified the body as that of McClinton. It was brought to Midland by steamer from Parry Sound. After being prepared at the undertaking parlors, the remains where taken to the home of the deceased’s parents, Dr. J.B.H. McClinton, where a private service was held Monday morning and internment made at Quaker Hill Cemetery near Uxbridge.

Was on a Fishing Trip

On Friday, October 31, of last year, the late Dr. McClinton, with Mr. A.L. Fitzgerald and T.C. Sheppard, of Penetang, went out in a launch for a fishing trip near the Watches, about 15 miles from Midland, and about 6 miles from Giant’s Tomb. They were on the homeward trip when Dr. McClinton left his companions in the cabin to see that their catch of fish in the stern of the launch was safe, as the weather was rough. He had only been gone a few minutes when his companions went aft and his floating cap told its story.

The launch was immediately turned, but a diligent search of the immediate vicinity failed to disclose any trace of him, as it was impossible to live for a few minutes in the icy waters.

Rough weather made it unsafe for small crafts to venture outside until Saturday, when Provincial Officer Harry Wright and a party of searchers went to the scene of the accident, while other boat went from Penetang.

In the succeeding days every available means, including airplanes and a specially constructed boat with portholes in the bottom, were used in an effort to recover the body, and several parties of searchers, including Provincial Officer Wright, spend days combing the area with grappling irons, but the rough nature of the bottom made the work difficult.

Even after heavy weather forced the searchers to abandon their task, watchers were kept along the shores in the vicinity for several day[s] in the hope the body would be washed ashore.

The late Dr. W.S. McClinton was born in Elmvale in 1895. He distinguished himself in his university course, and again in the great war, winning the Military Cross. Since the war he had practiced in Midland, where he took a keen interest in sports, hunting, fishing etc. He is survived by his wife, formerly Clara Crawford of Oro, and his parents Dr. J.B.H. and Mrs. McClinton.

Source: Northern Advance. August 13, 1931. Page 1.

“He is survived…” Preface This article is a departure from previous biographical pieces about the soldiers of the 18th Battalion because of the personal experiences of the author in the geographic area in which this story unfolds.