Sua Maxima Culpa: Through Their Most Grievous Fault

By Rebecca Sullivan

There was no way that I could defend my children and grandchildren from the warfare waged against us by the hierarchy of the Catholic Church.

No one came to our rescue and no one cared. This had and still angers me. It is Righteous anger and I thirst for justice. Justice that will only come to us when the Lord Jesus Christ returns to earth.

We were a good family and made to live in fear; never knowing what they would do next to harm us.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 17, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524626365

Rebecca Sullivan

Rebecca Sullivan is a recent graduate of the National University of Ireland, Galway, and is currently working full-time as a writer in Mayo. Her first novel, Night Owls and Summer Skies, was published by Wattpad Books in 2020 and has recently been adapted into a WEBTOON under the same name. Rebecca is obsessed with fluffy socks and anything to do with owls.

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© 2017 Rebecca Sullivan. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 12/16/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-4839-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-4840-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-2636-5 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016914019

Print information available on the last page.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorized Version). First published in 1611. Quoted from the KJV Classic Reference Bible, Copyright © 1983 by The Zondervan Corporation.

Contents

Chapter 1 A Town Cursed

Chapter 2 Silence Is Golden

Chapter 3 Appointment With Destiny

Chapter 4 An Ill Wind

Chapter 5 A Gift Of Agape (God’s Love)

Chapter 6 The Memorare

Chapter 7 The Green Dragon

Chapter 8 To Love Another Human Being

Chapter 9 Introibo Ad Altare Deo I Will Go To The Altar Of God

Chapter 10 The Letter

Chapter 11 Journey Into Hell

Chapter 12 Their Folly Will Be Made Known To All

Chapter 13 Chapter Twelve

Chapter 14 The Legacy

Chapter 15 On The Wings Of The Eagle

Chapter 16 Through Life Through Eternity

This work is dedicated to my three children, and my siblings.

To them, I apologize with a broken heart for the suffering they incurred because of me and the Catholic Church.

INTRODUCTION

2015

This book has not been published sooner for fear of the Roman Catholic Church … the Vatican. I am old now and eighty-four years old, I do not have much time left. My children and the world should know the truth of what really happened. Remember, dear reader, this could have happened to you, your mother, sister, daughter, wife or friend.

A priest is supposed to help you, not harm you. He is supposed to represent Christ on earth, to do good, not evil. There is no sin more evil than when it’s performed by a priest. For having once gained the knowledge of Christ and right and wrong, he has turned away from the Light of Christ to the darkness of Lucifer … to the Luciferian Consciousness, mind set and behavior.

Then, too, in his evil, he has the Catholic Church, the richest and the most powerful organization in the world, to back him in his evil no matter what he has done. He is simply sent to another parish to continue in his evil. Never has any power in the world been more feared than the Roman Catholic Church.

Little did I realize when I happily rang the doorbell of the Cathedral Rectory in April of 1966, that one day soon after, they would make certain that I would be made aware of their POWER.

Little by little, as an innocent by-sitter, I would be caught in a tangled web of witnessing immorality, deceit and hypocrisy. Three times I would be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Twice, I would be seen witnessing. Because of this, my children and I would suffer a severe persecution that lasts until this day.

I have worked very hard for everything received in life. I want NOTHING from the Catholic Church. Nothing on earth can make up to me and my children for what the Catholic Church has done to us. They can’t give us back our lives that they have stolen. No one came to our rescue, no one cared and we were frightened.

Since Passion Sunday in March 1969, never again could I walk my home town with a light hearted happiness I had before my finger pushed the doorbell of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral Church Rectory on that crisp day in April of 1966.

It is with much sadness that I write these words about what was once MY BELOVED CHURCH.

**To protect the innocent, all names have been changed.

There is nothing so powerful, as truth and often nothing so strange

— Daniel Webster

CHAPTER I

A TOWN CURSED

1959

I f you want to commit a murder and get away with it, go to the city of Altura, Pennsylvania, blasted Walter Winchell over nationwide radio.

Walter Winchell was radio’s Walter Cronkite of TV fame. For decades all of America would tune in to hear his newscasts, which were highly respected and even revered by many. People would take their coffee breaks to hear him talk about world affairs. Winchell was known to the common people for his moral standards and accurate reports.

This particular newscast shocked the late 1950’s Life with Father generation. However, it did not shock the citizens of the small city of Altura. They knew the truth. What surprised them was that it had been mentioned on nationwide news by the greatest newscaster of the world.

With the announcement came the hope that someone would make the necessary changes in their city. But this was futile wishing.

What prompted Winchell to make this blatant statement? It was a case well known to the inhabitants of the city. It went back to 1945 when Officer Biddle murdered his eighteen-year-old wife, Lucille. She was found with rope marks around her neck and wrists. Her small body had been severely beaten and shoved out of a second-story window of the Biddle apartment. A few days before her death, Lucille told her aunts (the Johnsons) that she feared for her life because of her husband’s constant abuse.

The night Lucille died, neighbors heard her screams for help. They called the police, but no one came. They called the police many times before, but always to no avail. Officer Biddle was not only feared by his wife, neighbors, and residents of the city, but also by fellow policemen. They knew that he was dangerous and that he had ties to the Mafia.

Altura was controlled by the Mafia, and because Biddle was associated with them, no one questioned him about his wife’s death. He denied killing her and said that she fell out of the window.

Lucille’s body lay in repose at her two spinster aunts’ home next to city hall. My sister, Greta, and I went to see her. As she lay in her coffin, how beautiful she looked with her white skin against her flaming red hair. She looked like a china doll lying there—so still.

I was five years younger than Lucille. Disbelief engulfed me as I looked down at her. She looked so young that it seemed that at any moment she would rise and come play with me.

At the viewing, I heard her aunts relate some of the gruesome events surrounding her death. They said that Lucille told them that she feared for her life.

Hundreds of mourners lined up to say good-bye to Lucille. People of the city were deeply saddened by her death. It was incomprehensible to look down upon someone so young and small whose life had been snuffed out in such a cruel manner. To deepen the sorrow of everyone, especially her aunts, Officer Biddle got away with the crime.

Lucille’s aunts never got over this atrocity of justice. They took photographs of her bruised body while lying in the coffin. They cut out every newspaper clipping related to the case, including the trial and acquittal of Officer Biddle. All of these photographs and clippings the aunts taped to the many windowpanes of their enclosed front porch and to the inside glass of the storm door where they could be seen.

The newspaper clippings remained on the windows for about fourteen years. Every day, Biddle could see them as he entered and exited his place of employment: city hall.

The Johnsons and the people of Altura hoped that the clippings would haunt Biddle. They did not. In fact, he seemed more arrogant and defiant than before. About fourteen years later, ignoring the city’s hatred for him and the yellowed, curled newspapers taped to the Johnsons’ windows, he murdered again.

He murdered his second wife and once again he was acquitted. It was in regard to this that Winchell spoke to America. It is believed that the aunts wrote Winchell of the story after the death of his second wife.

One day, the clippings were gone from the Johnsons’ windows. Perhaps the sisters gave up or they died. It was more likely that it was the latter. Nothing was ever done. Life went on and things went on as usual. The average citizen was powerless to alter the justice system of their city. They knew who made the important decisions and the Biddle case was a constant reminder.

Time passed. Teenagers, myself included, who walked to Altura High School from the west side, learned that something was not right in their city. Oftentimes large, black Cadillacs belonging to Mafia Kingpin Al, head of the Alturu Mafia, and his henchmen were parked on the busy sidewalk on the main street at the side of Al’s restaurant, The Whispering Gardens.

The front of this restaurant faced the main avenue. These thoroughfares were in the heart of Altura. It was a busy corner with much traffic passing, especially at three o’clock in the afternoon when the kids would be coming home from school. It was dangerous for them to walk out onto the main street to get around cars.

We saw policemen patrolling the area on foot and in patrol cars. Never did they ticket these cars nor reprimand the drivers for illegal and dangerous parking. Sometimes the cars would be there for long periods of time. Eventually, the short, dark men in their black clothing would walk from the restaurant with an air of defiance and drive away.

The beautiful Whispering Gardens was a favorite eating place for the better class of people. It was also known for illegal happenings, such as numbers, setting up prostitution, and illegal gambling in the back room. Officer Biddle would be seen coming in and out of the back room and sometimes in the company of the men in black.

One Saturday night in the mid-1940s, men in black entered a bar on the east side of town. Local men were in the bar drinking and chatting. These men went to the jukebox and looked over the titles of the records. One man nodded to the other, picked up a chair, and smashed it into the top of the jukebox. The three men walked over to the bartender, the owner. Breathing heavily, the shortest man said, You were told to put a Sinatra record in the jukebox. There is none. If there isn’t one there the next time we come, your bar gets it. Do you understand?

The owner stuttered a yes.

The local men were silent as the henchmen walked out of the bar. One said, Why don’t you call the police?

I can’t. I have my family to think about. They have the entire city tied up, said the owner in a fearful voice.

This open display of lawbreaking with the policemen closing their eyes was not a good example for the youth of the city. To exacerbate the situation, the police would arrest the youth on minor offenses. They did this because they were unable to arrest the real criminals of the city. The police needed to exercise some authority in order to feel that they were doing their job and to feel important.

The following true story explains how the police operated in Altura. Multiply this story many times and you will understand why the police of this city, in the mid-1940s, were known as child and drunk arresters.

When I was thirteen years old, my sister, Greta, and I were given permission to go sledding. Around six o’clock this cold winter evening we met four friends—who were thirteen and fourteen years old—a block away. All had received permission from their parents to go sledding. We had been sledding for about half an hour when we saw a police car coming toward us from two blocks away. Greta, who knew how the police operated, told us to hide. We did not know why, but we hid. I heard the urgency in Greta’s voice so I hid behind a car and hollered to Tommy to hide. He did not understand.

Hiding behind a car, I watched as two policemen stepped out of the patrol car and approached Tommy. They began questioning him. They asked him what he was doing when they could see that he was holding on to the rope of a sled. In a meek voice Tommy told them he was sledding.

The policeman raised his voice and said, Sledding is not permitted in the city limits.

Tommy replied, I did not know that.

Are you getting wise with us? asked the officer in a loud voice. We see a lot of wise guys like you. Tommy quivered as the officer hovered over him.

I’m not getting wise, sir, replied Tommy.

Don’t talk back to us, the officer shouted.

Tommy replied in a loud voice, I am not talking back, sir.

I saw the officer lean down and pick Tommy up by his coat collar. You wise guy. How old are you? asked the shortest officer.

I’m fourteen, he answered.

We don’t like wise guys. We’re taking you to city hall. We’ll see how wise you are there. Where do you live? We will learn that at city hall.

At these words, Tommy dropped to the ground—and out of the clutches of the man.

Oh please don’t take me to jail. I didn’t do anything wrong, whimpered Tommy.

The officer leaned down and took Tommy by the coat sleeve. He looked so small sitting on his butt, looking up at the tall men. He began to struggle as they pulled him into the car.

Shivering behind the car I wiped away a tear shaking my head in disbelief. I wondered how this could be happening. Tommy was a good boy who was always obedient and always ran home as soon as his mother called him. I was afraid that they would hurt him. We heard about the police beating men in their cells.

That night as I lay in bed I recalled a year earlier when Helen, my friend, and I visited the jail cells of the police station, City Hall. We did so that day because the nun told us that it was our Christian duty to visit the imprisoned. We told the policeman at the desk that we came to visit the imprisoned. He led us up dingy, dark stairs. We passed several empty cells before we saw a man lying on the cold cement cell floor. He was laying in a pool of his own blood. I wanted to cry as I looked at him.

What happened to the man, sir? I asked. No response was given.

Can’t you help him? I asked somewhat angrily. Again no response. I wondered why he had permitted two young children to see such a sight. Perhaps he just came on duty and did not know that the man had been jailed.

It left a lasting impression on me and made me fearful for Tommy. I cried myself to sleep that night. The next day after the sledding incident, my mother read aloud the article in the newspaper giving the policemen’s account of what happened.

Mother read, Last evening a fourteen-year old male was arrested for sledding in the city, talking back to the police and resisting arrest.

I told mother that it was not true. Mother, I heard everything. It did not happen that way. I heard the whole things as I was hiding behind a car near Tommy. They are lying. Not only did they pick on a kid for no good reason, they are lying about him.

My mother said, You heard the saying, ‘You can’t fight City Hall’. Well, it’s true, Rebecca. This happens to children of families who are not well off in the city. This is the reason I tell you children not to get in any trouble, to watch who you run with and be careful of every move you make. We will never be given the same treatment as the wealthy.

Mother should know all about the law as she had been a secretary to two attorneys on the Avenue. She knew of the injustices.

The case of officer Biddle, Mafia Al, the incident at the east-side bar, the incident of Tommy, injustices of the nuns and priests at Saint Patrick’s School that I attended and other incidences too numerous to mention, taught me at a young age not to trust anyone, especially those in authority and to stay away from all of them.

There were many other undercover deeds occurring in the city; some kept secret for years. Some never discovered. However, the truth in most cases came out sooner or later. One thing that the citizens of Altura knew for certain was that Kingpin Al ran the city including the police. All eyes were closed to Mafia Al’s doings even the watchful eyes of the Catholic Church.

Kingpin Al was a short, homely man who always had a cigar in his mouth. His small body could and did carry a death sentence if he so chose. There was always silence as he passed. In his presence you could feel the fear of those he came in contact with. He would go nowhere without his henchmen; their power could be felt.

Al was a member of the Catholic-Italian parish in Altura. Some believed that he controlled the church. Others were too afraid to voice their opinion. He needed the church for his own credibility and prestige. In return he gave the church much money from his illicit goings-on.

The priests would focus on the small sins of the poorer people of the parish. They could feel free to mention these from the pulpits knowing the poor would not defend themselves. They would not dare to mention the foibles of the rich as they may lose money. They never gave any mention to nor reprimanded Mafia Al from the pulpits for anything he did. Nothing was ever mentioned of his adulterous affairs with women of the parish.

Helen, my friend and I went to The Whispering Gardens for a meal after the theater. As usual the restaurant was crowded. We were seated, ordered our meal and chatted. Helen told me to turn around and see who was coming in, Lo and Behold, there was officer Biddle, strutting in with his cocky attitude. He went to the back and disappeared behind the door.

Will he ever be punished for what he has done?

Helen replied, Those kind never do. It seems that they get away with everything.

A short time later, men in black came out of the back and exited the front door. ‘God only knew what was being planned back there,’ I thought.

Mother told me of some of Altura’s business men’s attitude toward the working girl, especially those who worked on the Avenue. If a business man desired a working girl for sex and she did not comply, she may be lied about, fired, and black-listed from working in Altura. After all she may tell on him so he had to get her first. Her reputation would be ruined sometimes never to be able to work again. My mother should know as ‘it happened to her’. And being a secretary to two attorneys, she had access to just about all that went on in the city.

Altura was a tight inter-connected Protestant city. There was the network of wealthy businessmen, politicians along with Mafia Al and the churches who ruled the city, each using authority and fear to control the masses.

Those in authority knew what was necessary to protect themselves and their own self-interest. There were always concessions to be made. Businessmen, politicians, clergy and the police knew when it was wise to step back for kingpin Al. This was on one hand; on the other hand, Kingpin Al feared and respected the Catholic Church because of their authority over his Catholic-Italian soul. The average person feared the money behind the businessmen, the power behind the politicians, the authority behind the police, the threat of the Mafia and the threat, rejection and damnation from the Catholic Church.

If the average person was involved in an accident with a business man who was at fault, you could bet that poor Joe Shmoe would be blamed and punished. The same was true if an average kid got in a fight with a well-to-do-kid, the poor was always blamed and punished.

A man of the cloth could set the community against you, if he so desired. Most of them were pompous and had an authoritative attitude over their uneducated flock. He could have you excommunicated from the Catholic Church, the worst disgrace known to a Catholic. This was rare, but the thought was there and they let it be made known to you especially if you were poor.

Growing up we were told of these things. Mother warned us that we must always be obedient to the Catholic Church and those in authority or we may suffer dire consequences. She told us that the rich were favored, but never-the-less, Be a good example to Protestants, walk straight, be clean, watch how you sit and always be moral. Never leave the Catholic Church or do anything against it. A priest has the power to put a curse on you and send your soul to eternal damnation … hell. (My mother came from the Pennsylvania Dutch Hills and they believed in spells and such). A priest can fix it so that you will not be able to be buried in a Catholic cemetery. Nothing could be worse than that except … excommunication.

In Altura, in the mid-1940’s and before, the Church was the only outlet for Catholic people. For Catholics, the Church was their very life, love, entertainment, mentor and guardian. There was no T.V. The Church told you from the pulpit what to read which movies to see (from the ‘Legion of Decency’ magazine), who to marry and how to save your eternal soul from hell. To keep from temptation, you must go to the Holy Sacrament of Confession once a month and the Holy Sacrament of Communion once a week. To miss one of these Sacraments over a period of time makes you an inactive Catholic and you run the risk of being ostracized openly or loudly in the confessional. If a member of the Church did not go to Communion for a few weeks (believe me, the parishioners would notice). The parishioners would wonder what sin he-she (mostly she) committed. The sin that was suspected was fornication or adultery. So in order to be respected in the church, the girl would walk to the communion rail saying in effect, Look at me. Am I not a good girl? I have not sinned. Even if she had.

Never was a priest wrong no matter what he did or didn’t do. If you openly disagreed with a priest, you were wrong. Neighbors, friends and relatives would shun you. You could never speak out, defend yourself or tell of your feelings. The people of the city lived in constant fear of those in authority and power. They felt that they had to walk the chalk line. Plus, each person had their own private hell at home and within his/her own being.

Altura, Pennsylvania is mid-way between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Once a thriving railroad city, it once boasted of a population of about 83,000, in the 1940’s. The height of its prosperity lasted about fifty years.

But no longer do you hear the many trains with their eerie whistles blowing, nor the sound of their engines chugging their heavy loads up the mountains. Today, it is a depressed small city with a population of about 50,000.

Altura is surrounded by mountains which rob the city of half an hour of daylight in the mornings and half an hour of light in the evenings. Some have said that this loss of hour each day gives more dark for the Devil’s work. One elderly, Jewish woman told my friend, Jennie, that the town is possessed by the Devil and the town is satanic and damned.

A few years ago, Kay, a black woman, was going from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia by train to set up a religious organization in Philadelphia. When she arrived on the outskirts of Altura, she said that she was overcome by an ominous feeling that the city was satanic. She felt that it needed help to be saved from Satan. The urge to get off the train was so overwhelming that she knew her organization must be set up in here. She located her office in the center of the city. She kept insisting that the town needs help from the powerful satanic force that she feels is present.

Bernadine who belongs to a group called, ‘Christian Women’ feels the same way. She said the people of Altura have a right to know what they are up against … Satan.

The small city nestles in its own ugliness. Like a mist it holds its own sins close to its bosom not permitting them to transcend nor escape over the mountains. People feel the depression as soon as they approach the outskirts of the city. Many who live here lose their will to do much of anything. Their lives become dull and boring so they delight in any gossip, real or imagined. They develop ‘itchy ears’. The slightest incident receives much attention, becomes magnified, exaggerated and made exciting.

Because the town is secluded and has great distances from any large city, it answers to no law but its own. Fifty years behind the times it has been the butt of jokes from George Burns, Dorothy Kilgallen (well-known United States columnist) and Altura’s own Hollywood actress, Joan Bartlett.

My husband, Jim, and I left the area twice in the early years of our marriage. Twice, circumstances beyond our control warranted our return and kept us here by a force. By a force meant for me to fulfill my destiny.

Most people become locked into the town’s strange mode of living and depression. They accept it. I do not. They give in and give up to the ways of a city that is said to be cursed. I kept my optimistic personality.

Legend has it that Altura was cursed by an old Indian chief. In the beginning, when the white man took over this Indian territory they acquiesced. However, in the late 1800’s when the Pennsylvania Railroad laid tracks westward, they violated the Indian burial grounds. The insult was too great. The old Indian chief screamed out and cursed all the inhabitants, present and future generations of the Cherokee Indian lands of Altura. This name was chosen by the Cherokee Indian name meaning ‘High Lands of great worth’.

The Indian chief cursed the white man’s labor on the railroad tracks. He shrieked that no one would ever find happiness or success in the community. He vowed that only hatred, greed and an ill-wind would prevail in what was once his beloved land. Land that once welcomed him and its own. Land, where once they ran free as spirited horses, was now foreign to them. Their sense of freedom was gone, torn from them because of the white man. The chief cursed that the same misfortune would befall the white man.

A heaviness lays over Altura. Disinterest, depression and debaucheries prevail in the city. Sins and emotions of hatred, fear, lust and greed are everywhere and appear to be held close to the land’s bosom by an ill-wind.

It appears that the enraged words of Walter Winchell condemning Altura in the late 1950’s did not deaden the incensed utterance of the old Indian chief in the 1840’s. I believe that his screamed curses still reverberate from the mountains, unable to escape; to be eternally fulfilled … eternally damned …

A Town Cursed

It is only from this background that the following true story could have taken place.

CHAPTER II

SILENCE IS GOLDEN

1966

I It was a warm, sunny day in late April. The newness of life was everywhere and the crisp smell of spring was in the air. The new, green leaves were dancing in the sunlight. Bits and pieces of debris were caught in a soft whirlwind and went swirling and twirling about only to land in small clusters near and about. One such cluster landed at my feet just as I stepped up to the door of the rectory.

‘It was a good day,’ I thought as I rang the doorbell and stomped the debris from my feet. I looked up to the left at the high beautiful dome of the magnificent Cathedral Church. It seemed to beckon me as a mother to a child. The dome looked fruitful with her round, cement curves blossoming. The steeple jutted upward into the heavens proudly announcing its power to the universe. It appeared extremely powerful. I smiled with disbelief with my visit this day to actually start an organization. To be part of my church was something that I had desired all my life.

Mrs. Bradley, the elderly housekeeper, answered the door. She was round and neat in a housedress and apron.

Good afternoon, Mrs. Bradley. I’m Mrs. Sullivan. I have an appointment with Father Pierce for three o’clock. I’m a little early.

Yes, she said curtly. I’ll tell him you’re here."

She walked slowly with a limp toward the kitchen. While waiting in the foyer I could see the elderly Monsignor Casey seated at the desk in the left room.

Good afternoon, Monsignor Casey. I called.

He looked up from his newspaper and over his spectacles. Never moving his head, he mumbled, Good afternoon. He neither smiled nor acknowledged me as someone he had known for twenty-seven years.

‘Oh well,’ I thought. ‘That’s Monsignor Casey … that is, unless you are wealthy.’

I chuckled and thought to myself, ‘Where by ye entertain angels unawares.’

Mrs. Bradley returned and ushered me into the room to the right. Be seated, she said. Father will be here shortly. She studied me for a few seconds as she continued to dry her hands on a dish towel.

I smiled and said, Thank you. She exited.

I felt confident this day in my green tweed suit. It made my five feet, three-inch, 116 lb. frame appear tall and business like. Green suede gloves and shoes added the perfect touch. I gently brushed my dark, shoulder length hair from my face as I sat down. I wanted to impress the young priest psychiatrist and had hopes that he would help me with my cause today.

My watch said 2:50. The rustle of the newspaper from across the hall took my attention to the strict Monsignor that I had known since I was seven years old in the second grade. I smiled remembering how every child shook in his shoes when Father Casey would enter the class room. I recalled that during his Sunday Mass sermons that the adults shook in their shoes also. He got his messages across in short order … with the roar of a lion. He frightened the adults especially when his sermons were about what a parishioner did wrong during the past week. I thought that people liked to get hell sometimes, as long as it was not directed to them. It got their blood going and kept them on their toes. It gave them something to talk about for the next week because it meant that that someone in the parish did the awful thing that was talked about from the pulpit. Nearly everyone tried to figure out who it was and sooner or later all would know who the guilty party was.

The priests always knew everything about everyone in the parish. They recognized the parishioner in the confessional (I would later learn). They also had their favorite members of the parish who were wealthy or informants. Usually these people were more upstanding Catholics (on the surface) and they wanted to get the priests on their side if and when it may be needed.

The informants would fill the priests in on the doings, sins and problems of their fellow parishioners. The confessional box would let the priests know who the sinners were. Often a priest would adopt an intact family of his parish. This family would also relate goings-on in the parish. So the clergy was well aware of everything in the parish.

As I sat in the reception room I thought, ‘Monsignor Casey has mellowed with age. He has slowed down due to his hip injury. He does get around alright with the help of his walker.’

‘Dear Lord, seeing him here is taking me back twenty-nine years to my entrance into the first grade at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral School, a Catholic-Irish parish.’ I wiped away a tear. Thoughts of my First Confession, First Holy Communion, Confirmation, Processions, Novenas and services during Lent glided across my mind.

I smiled remembering the processions that took place on special Holy days. As the organ music played loudly and powerfully flowers would be dropped all over the aisles and it was very beautiful. The nuns would order us, Get flowers, or else. I did not want the ‘or else’, so flowers I got. I would steal flowers from Protestant yards, whispering prayers asking them for forgiveness as I dropped their flowers on the aisles of the beautiful large, Saint Patrick’s Cathedral Church. I consoled myself that they were taken for a good cause; Christ and the Catholic Church.

Lent was always a sad time for me. Each afternoon during lent the children were lined up and marched across the street to the church. We knelt on the cement floor before each of the Twelve Stations of the Cross to pray. Our knees ached. The nuns said that this would help us better understands the sufferings of Christ. The sufferings of Jesus and His death on the cross would always have a special place in my heart. There were many services we had to attend during Lent.

The priests were part of these rituals. We knew they were there, but they were kept apart from us in their own world. They had an impact on us, but more so on the nuns who would bow to the priests when they entered the class room. Most of the children would try to avoid them especially those of poor families. Unlike the other children I saw the priests as inexperienced and unknowledgeable about life itself. Their world guarded them and protected them from life’s hardships. So as a child I felt wiser than they.

Smiling, I thought of Fathers Flynn, O’Sullivan, Casey and Brennan. I remember at age five when Father Flynn called to us from across the street to recite the rosary. I was afraid to cross the street because my older sister, Greta, had called me into the path of an on-coming car that summer and I was struck by the car. It necessitated my going to the doctor. The last thing my mother said was, Greta, watch Rebecca. Don’t let her get hit by a car.

Fathers Casey and O’Sullivan were caught up in their own self-importance. They could be heard screaming at each other from inside the rectory by those who walked by. Protestants were heard talking about it. Father Brennan was a tall, quiet man. He was liked, as was our short, red-faced Father Flynn.

My thoughts raced back on how I became a student of Saint Patrick’s School. Shortly after my father had returned from Utah in February of 1931, my parents left Altura for Pittsburgh to seek employment. It was nearing the end of the depression. Greta was nearly four years old. I was born in Pittsburgh in 1931. Mary was born there jn 1933. We returned to Altura on September, 1933 to a rent-free house owned by a relative. Greta was enrolled in Saint Paul’s School. Gerald was born there on March 15, 1934.

My handsome, handsome father. He was about five feet-nine inches tall, black hair, beautiful large blue eyes, long black eye lashes and a smile that captured your heart. He was a poet, a carpenter, an artist and played the banjo. He had been treated as a rich boy by his mother as she had been a servant in the Sullivan mansion before she married grand pap Sullivan.

I remember that spring, a storm approached and our back porch was flooding. My mother, frantic, was sweeping the water out with a broom. Rebecca, get daddy and tell him what’s happening and to get down here.

I ran upstairs to find daddy sleeping. Next to the bed was a bucket with a small amount of vomit in it.

Daddy, get up. There is a flood and mother is sweeping the water out with a broom. She needs you.

He replied softly, She can take care of it.

While living here, I realized my own daring. We lived next door to a wonderful black family. Greta dared me to go over in the yard and kiss him. I was five years old and he was about six. I went out of the yard, opened his gate and went to him and kissed him on the cheek. I turned and walked slowly out of the yard.

In 1936 my mother unable to cope, secretly left my father and moved into grandma’s beautiful home in the city. and to the parish and school of her youth, Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. We moved into the second floor. She was happy, but it was a sad time for us three girls who didn’t want to leave their father. But he could not get his act together.

To make matters worse for me at age five, mother sent me to Pittsburgh to live with my godfather, Uncle Bill, my Godfather, for the summer. He worked in the steel mills and owned a confectionary store. Their three beautiful daughters would sometimes awaken me in the middle of the night after their parents had gone to bed. We would sneak into the store and take candy and soda. It was fun. I cried a lot this summer as I missed my family, but this break away would help me adjust to being at school away from my mother.

My sister, Louise, was born in 1936.

As I sat there waiting for the priest to come, my thoughts flowed to my old school. Catechism was the first and most important subject. It was listed as Religion on our report card and treated as any subject. It was really the most important one and everyone tried to make a good grade in it.

In the first grade an important question was asked, Why did God make you? We were given the answer, God made you to know Him, to love Him and to serve Him in this world to be happy with Him in the next.

I chuckled thinking of the nuns disciplining us. It gave us codes to live by and bonded the students with a lasting camaraderie. Many times the punishments were harsh, sometimes cruel and unjust.

One such injustice happened to me at the beginning of the first grade, I was five years old. It was an event that would affect me for the rest of my life.

In the first grade Sister Mary Agnes placed the students in one of three groups; the Robins, Sparrows and the Wrens. I was placed in the Robin Group, the smartest. I sat in front of the nun’s desk. This one morning, we were getting ready to take a test. Sister gave the instructions, while standing near the windows a distance away, the last of which I did not hear. I asked Barbara, my seat partner, what the nun said.

Stop cheating, Rebecca, hollered the nun.

But sister Mary Agnes, I … my voice faltered … Dead silence filled the room. My heart was broken. All morning her words ached my heart.

‘Mother will help me make sister understand that I was not cheating.’ At lunch time, mother was informed what happened. She told me everything would be alright that she would come down and talk with the nun.

That afternoon, I waited patiently to hear a knock at the door. Finally, it came. Sister Mary Agnes opened the door and mother could be seen. She gave me a reassuring smile as the nun walked out the door.

A few minutes later Sister Mary Agnes stepped inside the room. She had a smile on her face. The moment she closed the door, her smile turned into an evil scowl. She folded her arms across her mid-section and through clenched teeth, she screamed, If anyone wishes to sit with a cheat and a liar, sit with Rebecca Sullivan. She …. Her voice dwindled, but her words would be forever burned in my mind. I was only five years old.

When I got home from school that day, mother asked me how things went. I smiled and It is alright. Thank you for coming to school. How long do I have to go to this school?

She was pleased and answered, Eight years.

So I consoled myself that I would be free in eight years.

I knew the meaning of a cheat and a liar and I was neither. At five years old I had an inborn ethical code. Also grandma and mother instilled into us the difference between right and wrong. Grandma said we were breaking the Eighth Commandment if we lie. Not even in jest would she lie. Grandma was strict German-Catholic and came from the German hillsides of the Dutch mountains.

Being a semi-invalid, grandma had her bedroom in the downstairs front room. She had a picture of the Blessed Mother on her wall with a tear falling from her eye. Also there was a beautiful, black velvet mural of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane on the wall above a black leather chase lounge. A portable pot was kept near her bed. Everything was always so clean and neat.

I would sit on a chair near her bed and talk with her. She told me that the end of the world was near and the people of the world were getting worse. She said that all men should be hung by their feet, upside down on a tree and have their bottoms cut off.

‘That’s terrible,’ I thought, not knowing what should be cut off.

Oh you poor little Sullivan children. Your father is an alcoholic and it is in the blood. This is a valley of tears, she would say with tears streaming down her face. The devil has your daddy by both heels.

One day while visiting her, the doorbell rang. I went to the door and there was my daddy.

Hello, daddy, I said. He smiled and went to the stairs to go up to our living quarters. I watched his feet as he walked up the steps. He got to about one-fourth of the way up and I hollered, Grandma, the devil doesn’t have my daddy by both heels. His foot faltered for a few seconds and then continued up. I turned to walk into grandma’s room and I called loudly, Grandma, I don’t see the devil at daddy’s heels. I remember her face was red as a beet when I neared her.

Later that day, mother and dad were in the kitchen of our upstairs living area. I was jumping on the bed. Daddy called to me to stop jumping. I ignored him and kept jumping. He told me again to stop and again, I ignored him. He called, Rebecca, stop jumping on the bed or I am going to spank you.

I called loudly as I kept jumping, It won’t be the first time, daddy.

At that, he left the kitchen and came into the bedroom. He picked me up off the bed, turned me over his knee and gave me a spanking. He then placed my feet firmly on the ground, looking me directly in the eyes he said, And, little girl, it won’t be the last.

We were forced to attend Sunday Mass from the age of five. Every Sunday evening our grandparents would call us downstairs to listen to the Catholic Hour. We children were told to sit on the floor near the radio and not to make a sound. It started out with the beautiful song, ‘Ave Maria’; followed by sermons from a man with the most beautiful voice ever heard. The love glowing from our grandparents when the church was mentioned instilled in us a longing and a hunger for Christ and the Catholic Church.

Because of the incident with Sister Mary Agnes, I developed a fear of Father Flynn calling me across the street to recite the Hail Mary. I lost confidence in myself and was sure that she told him that I was a cheat and a liar. I became more afraid that I would be hit by a car in crossing the street as I recalled Greta calling me into the path of a car leaving me with an unseen injury; a dislocated hip.

My fear of what the nun may do affected my test scores as well as my participation in the classroom. I was now in the low class, the Sparrows. Her hurtful words taught me never to tell anyone how the nuns and priests treated us because there was a price to pay for telling. The philosophy that ‘silence is golden’ became my code. Silence keeps you out of trouble. However, years later I would learn that my silence was not seen as golden, but was misunderstood and seen as a threat to the holy ones and only to cause me much sorrow.

None-the-less, this terrible incident with Sister Mary Agnes and others to come were necessary barriers that were meant to come between me and them for my own protection later. I learned to keep my distance.

Five months later, Sister gave me a note to take to Sister Mary George who taught the fourth grade. My sister Greta and other students told me that she was terribly mean. As instructed I knocked on the door. I could hear the nun screaming and then a loud thump. She did not call me to enter.

You stupid little girl how many times do I have to tell you that nine plus five equals fourteen? Was heard through the door.

I knocked again, still no answer. There was another thump and more screaming.

‘Oh dear,’ I thought ‘This note must be delivered or I am in big trouble. Sister Mary Agnus may put me back in the low group again and I just got out of it. She may holler at me in front of the class.’

I knocked louder and still no answer, so I meekly opened the door. This was forbidden unless you were told to enter, so it took courage for me to enter. What I saw numbed and shocked me to where I went stiff. Sister Mary George was holding Greta by the neck. She banged her head so hard against the chalk board that the chalk dust escaped from the cracks (partitions) of the large slate boards. (She did this to others also).

Nine plus five equal fourteen, screamed the nun as she banged her head again. I’m sick of telling you. She turned and looked at me and screamed, What do you want? She did not know that I was Greta’s sister. Greta looked at me sadly. I wanted to cry out, ‘Don’t you hurt my sister.’

Sister Mary Agnes sent me with this note, I said. I glanced around the room at the students. They looked frightened and sad.

Put it on my desk, she screamed.

It broke my heart to leave my sister with her. I knew as soon as my hand turned the door knob of the class room that mother must be told.

On the way home, Greta was still shaking from the incident. She pleaded with me not to tell mother. But I knew it had to be told and after all, I could tell because it was not about me. As soon as I entered our kitchen, I told mother what happened. The next day, in a fit of rage, Mother went down to the school. She told the nun that she was taking Greta out of the Catholic School. The nun pleaded with her not to do so. They came to an understanding and Greta stayed. The nun never hurt her again.

The second grade was without incident. In the summer of 1939, we moved from grandma’s lovely home to a mini-mansion, just three blocks away. The house had three stairways, nine rooms and a large yard. Mother and dad got back together again, but it would be for only a short time.

We could see our Grandfather Sullivan’s mansion from between the houses across the street. It is a large, beautiful home. Here my father’s mother, Bertha Davis, was a servant. John Emerson Sullivan, one of ten children, fell in love with her and they married.

The Sullivan’s were wealthy jet-setters of Altura. The rich of the city would wait to see the cars that the Sullivan boys would buy and they would follow suit. The Sullivans had six servants and 17 black workers. They owned 40 % of the city at one time; from center city up and past Sullivan Road on Red Hill to well beyond.

This year, I started the third grade with much trepidation as the teacher was sister Mary George. She had mellowed much, so there was no cruelty. She did tell us that all Protestants were going to hell. Because my father was Protestant this separated me further from the church. His mother, Bertha Sullivan, was Catholic, but a priest treated her cruelly when she asked him for advice. He told her that she got herself into it so you get yourself out of it. So she left the church for good.

So not only