Justicia

It's weird that every time I think about the soon-to-be-told story, I think of the word "justice" in Spanish: justicia. I don't know why, but it's the best sounding word for how I feel. You'd think maybe the Portuguese justiça, considering the situation. But nope, JUSTICIA.

Back in July, before I'd shared my story so widely about what happened on my mission, I realized that I had an opportunity to do something to perhaps protect others from my mission trainer, who I'm positive isn't a one-time attacker. She lives in Brazil and is far away from me (thankfully), but this also meant that it would be harder for me to try to stop her. Then I thought of my second mission president because he has connections with the Brazil North Area presidency of the church. He came into the mission at the beginning of July 2001 and my trainer left a couple of weeks later and was in his first grupo de saída. (Leaving group? What's that called in English?) Thus my mission pres had met her once, when she left.

I realized that I could contact him with what happened to me and maybe something could be done. I didn't know what or how, but I had to try because ever since she left the mission she'd been working in the relief society or young women. Yeah, brilliant, I know. So I wrote my mission president an email--well I wrote one letter first using lots of Brazilian swear words and lots of sentences that minced no words about how I felt about that deplorable "human" being. But then I wrote a second letter devoid of the swears detailing how she "groomed" me (got me to the point that I couldn't fight back, essentially making me feel that I couldn't count on anyone but her and much less myself). I then explained how she abused me, what, how often where (in a stake center a bunch). A few days after sending the letter, I heard back from him that things were on track to happen, interviews within a church framework.

This knowledge relieved me, b/c I didn't want anyone else to suffer b/c of her like I had suffered all those previous years.


Recently I found the courage to ask my mission president if he'd heard anything further, if there was any info that I would be allowed to know. He told me a few things, but the most important one is that she cannot hold a position of authority in the church--well any position of anything in the church right now. He couldn't tell me the exact form of discipline in the church that had been levied (I don't even know if he knows), but he could tell me that she'd been heavily disciplined.

She has been blocked from hurting people within church settings.

So very few people in my situation see any form of justice--¡JUSTICIA! In fact only 3% of rapists see ANY jail time. The numbers don't improve much for assault or molestation victims seeing any form of justice, especially since there's a stupid statute of limitations of 7 years usually. So if the 4 year old figures out at age 13 what happened, oh well.

The fact that I have seen my abuser have repercussions, that I know that she's been outed in front of church authorities even with any denial on her part--I mean, the fact that I know all of this justice is simply... well, I don't know what to call it. I've been with this knowledge for a little while now and I still don't have words for how I feel. I still don't think I know how I feel.

But still: ¡JUSTICIA!