Texas CTA shows PBS film on sex abuse blocked by diocese

Call To Action/Rio Grande Valley in McAllen,Tex. is making headlines for courageous work to tell the truth about clergy sexual abuse. Latest developments arose when public television’s Frontline Jan. 16 aired in prime time a feature-length documentary, "Hand of God,” the personal story of Paul Cultrera, survivor of sexual abuse by a serial pedophile priest in the 1960s near Boston. Nearly every PBS station in America showed the film — but not KMBH, a local PBS affiliate owned by the Catholic Diocese of Brownsville.

CTA/RGV publicly challenged the censorship. They were told that Msgr. Pedro Briseño, the station manager appointed by Brownsville Bishop Raymundo Peña, wanted to watch the film first to see if it was appropriate for local viewers. The news was picked up by the AP wire and was carried in newspapers across the country.

As part of national CTA’s JustChurch project, CTA/Rio Grande Valley also took nonviolent gospel action to bring to south Texans in another way the film the diocese didn't want them to see. They rented Cine El Rey, a theater in McAllen, and invited Paul Cultrera and his brother, Joe, the filmmaker, to bring the film personally and discuss its contents with the audience. It all happened Sunday, Feb. 18. Over 300 watched the story of Paul's boyhood nightmare, how he kept it secret for decades, finally revealing it in 1994 — and how the Archdiocese of Boston under Cardinal Bernard Law then responded to his claims with cover-up and denial.

While the film rolled, audience members sat in front of a large sign that urged Bishop Peña to “do the right thing” and release the names of all Valley priests accused of sexual abuse — a demand CTA/RGV has been making for months. After the movie Paul Cultrera urged the audience to take that message directly to the Valley's clergymen — some of whom were in the audience. “If the church is going to change, it’s up to you who care about it,” he said.

One change came quickly. Briseño and KMBH aired “Hand of God” during prime time March 1.

Deacon blames abuse on parents

Not all Catholics in the Valley agree that the official Church is responsible for priests' sexual abuse of children. The same Sunday that CTA was showing “Hand of God” at Cine El Rey, Deacon Alvin Gerbermann of Holy Spirit Parish in McAllen said in his homily at Mass that parents, not church officials, are to blame if their children suffer abuse from priests. He praised his own parents for never leaving him alone with a priest or nun.

“This is blaming the victim,” said Gerald Brazier, president of CTA/RGV. Once again the CTA chapter mounted a nonviolent protest. Many CTA members belong to the parish, and the pastor, Fr. Louis Brum, for the past year has excluded CTA members from all parish ministries. Local and national CTA together have besieged Bishop Peña with letters asking him to appoint a mediator to resolve priest-people conflicts at Holy Spirit. Fr. Brum was at the Mass where Gerbermann gave the offending sermon, and apparently found no problem with it.

CTA's nonviolent but spirited protests, fully covered by local media, got results. Within a week McAllen's daily paper, The Monitor, reported that Bishop Peña had temporarily barred Gerbermann from preaching homilies. The deacon is required to undergo additional training. He must retake the diocesan course on how to give homilies, and go through the “Protecting God's Children” program about preventing sexual abuse that the diocese instituted in response to the abuse crisis and the 2002 U.S. Bishops' Dallas Charter.

To follow and even participate in CTA JustChurch project activities in South Texas and in six other current U.S. action sites, visit www.cta-usa.org and click on "JUST CHURCH.”