[Dialogue] Thanks to P. Schrijnen

[mhampton at att.net]

Thank you, Geri,

As Quakers say, "This Friend speaks my mind.

I would have been disappointed if we had dismissed the hurts we allowed.  

Our pasts are approved and our future(s) open.

Grace and Peace.
Love and Light,
mary

-------------- Original message from "Geri Tolman" <gdtolman at comcast.net>: -------------- 


> Bill and/or Barbara, 
> 
> I'm surprised and saddened to hear that you were disappointed in the 
> Vale meeting and that you felt that your hopes of building long-term 
> relationships with colleagues got waylaid. 
> 
> It is my view that the abuse of our children that was finally 
> revealed in Vale was one of the most helpful steps we could have taken in 
> allowing our children to be finally heard, believed, and taken seriously. 
> To suggest that the abuse which went on was maltreatment "by a few people" 
> misses the whole point. We set ourselves up to be "an experimental family 
> religious order". In my opinion we were as arrogant and lax as the Catholic 
> Church was during that same period of time when they sheltered and 
> re-assigned pedophiles who were reported to their hierarchy. Living out of 
> "the past is approved" assumes, I believe, that you actually KNOW what went 
> on in the past, not that you were blissfully unaware of our organizational 
> failure to care for our children. It happened on "our watch" -- we all 
> failed the children whose lives were so brutally affected -- to claim 
> otherwise, to point the finger at a few, is to admit that the scope of our 
> caring wasn't as comprehensive as we pretended. 
> 
> Hopefully any talks about the future will consider this failure, 
> along with other failures, and will build in the necessary safeguards rather 
> than try to sweep them under the rug. 
> 
> Geri Tolman 
> 
> -----Original Message----- 
> From: dialogue-bounces at wedgeblade.net 
> [mailto:dialogue-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of William Alerding 
> Sent: Thursday, May 31, 2007 5:41 PM 
> To: Colleague Dialogue 
> Subject: [Dialogue] Thanks to P. Schrijnen 
> 
> Paul, 
> 
> We enjoyed your recent reflections, as well as Carlos Zervigon's. 
> You have articulated our beliefs also. We were shocked and saddened when the 
> Order was called out of being, but we too have readjusted our lives. Like 
> you, we still feel close to our old colleagues and enjoy hearing from them. 
> Hopefully, something helpful will come out of the gathering in Toronto. 
> 
> We were disappointed in our Vale meeting in 2000. Our hope of 
> building long-term relationships with our colleagues got waylaid when 
> everyone went off on a tangent out of guilt about how some of our youth were 
> maltreated by a few people. The whole experience went downhill from there, 
> while too many of our colleagues could not live out of "the past is 
> approved" understanding. It was difficult for us to see how we were going 
> to talk together about the future after it was decided to spend the rest of 
> our time rollercoasting downhill into the past. 
> 
> Thanks for articulating our feelings also. Love to Christine. 
> 
> Bill and Barbara Alerding 
> 
> 
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