Q&A with Kevin Lewis O'Neill, author of "Unforgivable"
The first book to expose how the Catholic Church systematically covers up scandal by moving abusers across borders.
Clerical sexual abuse is as global as the Roman Catholic Church, with bishops moving credibly accused priests not simply between parishes but also across international borders. Unforgivable follows the movement of one such perpetrator from the Great Plains of central Minnesota to the Indigenous highlands of Guatemala, where this priest had access to children and even raised one as his own.
Kevin Lewis O’Neill is Professor in the Department for the Study of Religion as well as in the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies at the University of Toronto. A cultural anthropologist, his work focuses on the moral dimensions of contemporary political practice in Latin America. His previous books include City of God, Secure the Soul, and Hunted.
How did you hear about Father David Roney?
I first heard rumors about Roney back in 2016 while I was in Guatemala for a different research project. I thought that if these stories about an American priest and a Guatemalan orphan turned out to be true, they could change how the world thinks about clerical sexual abuse: that the phenomenon is (and always has been) as global as the Roman Catholic Church.
What made you want to research such an unsavory element of the Roman Catholic Church?
I thought that I might be up to the challenge. “Who else could do this research?” I remember asking myself. I’m a cultural anthropologist with theological training in Catholic social thought. I had also grown up in the very kinds of Midwestern parishes that Roney had pastored; then, not unlike Roney himself, I spent decades in Guatemala. Relatively fluent in the history and culture of both milieus, I thought that I could handle the research. But I was wrong.
What were you wrong about?
I was unprepared for the scale of the abuse that I ended up documenting, the sophistication of the Church’s maneuverings, and its callous indifference once caught red-handed. It was also heartbreaking to witness the toll that it all took on the young orphan (now adult) who Roney raised. As per the title of my book, it all turned out to be totally unforgivable.
Once Roney left the United States for the highlands of Guatemala, he was no longer a problem in the eyes of Church leadership, because his abuse would no longer be open to legal prosecution and punishment in the same way.
Why has the Church’s practice of offshoring priests been so well hidden until now?
The litigation of clerical sexual abuse maintains a very strict national framework, for important reasons of church and state. While courts in the United States have forced the Church to pay billions of dollars to survivors of abuse, there is no mechanism to account for perpetrators who move across international borders. This means that once Roney left the United States for the highlands of Guatemala, he was no longer a problem in the eyes of Church leadership, because his abuse would no longer be open to legal prosecution and punishment in the same way. In this sense, his movement signals a clever and deeply calculated plan to protect assets, mitigate liability, and avoid scandal by shifting risk from North America to Latin America.
What has the Church done (besides settlements) to make amends for its central role in enabling sexual abuse?
Nothing of substance or consequence.
What kinds of actions could the Church take, in your opinion, to begin making amends?
The Church could take the position of radical transparency, which could begin a process of healing, but it is clear that leadership is not interested in taking full accountability for its crimes.
What is the message you hope Unforgivable communicates?
I’d love the reader to walk away with two insights. The first is that the phenomenon of clerical sexual abuse is far bigger than anyone has imagined, with perpetrators living on the lam to evade accountability. The second, deeply related to the first, is that this book is just the beginning. There is so much more work to be done to expose the global scale of clerical sexual abuse.
Learn more about Unforgivable