Читать книгу 28 Minutes to Midnight - Thomas Mahon - Страница 7

“Si, San Juan!” March 2, 1979 National Airlines Timetable Advertising New Air Service

25 Minutes to Midnight…

My ninth grade Spanish teacher, Senora Greene, was a real gem. One of the best I’ve ever encountered. She was sweet but expected nothing but the best from each and every one of us. Boy, did I learn that the hard way. One day I took this unit test and, afterward, felt I had done very well. In one of the sections, I was to respond to a series of questions, using complete sentences of my own.

-Do you have a sister? Si, tengo una hermana.

-Do you have a pet? Si, el nombre de mi perro es Christy.

-Have you ever been to Disney World? Si, fui con mi familia en Mayo.

There were about a dozen other such questions on the test. I quickly answered each one and thought I was incredibly sophisticated. I was able to respond to senora’s questions in the present, the present perfect and the preterit. Like Ralphie in A Christmas Story, I was certain my answers would simply blow Senora Greene out of the water. Not only would I earn an ‘A’, but I fully expected to see EXCELLENTE scrawled across the top of my paper in three inch letters, underlined twice and wrapped around a Red Rider B.B. Gun.

What I got back horrified me. My poor test was hemorrhaging red ink. Why, I asked myself? Where on earth did I go wrong? I spotted my mistake immediately. I had begun all of my sentences in that section with si. Anyone who knows anything about Spanish knows full-well that si means if. In order to have si mean yes I had to place an accent over the i. I failed to do that in every single, blessed instance. And for that crucial blunder I paid the price: a half-point penalty for every missing accent.

Yes, I could have taken greater care to proof read my answers before turning in my test. I didn’t. But I’ll tell you one thing: since that day I have never forgotten to accent that i. In fact I later caught this very mistake in an airline timetable. A local carrier had initiated service to Puerto Rico with a nifty slogan: Si, San Juan! If San Juan? I took out my red pen and immediately deducted a half-point. By the way, the airline is no longer in business.

Think back to all those math courses in high school and college. How many times did we put a positive in front of a number when it required a negative instead? How many times have we dialed a wrong number? How many times have we looked up a movie and misread the starting time? How many times have we forgotten to send that birthday card?

Mistakes. These are all mistakes. Preventable, yes, but they are mistakes.

So what should we make of the case of Father Gustavo Miyares, former priest for the Archdiocese of Miami? Father Miyares actually served as my vocation director in the early 80s. From what little I can remember, he seemed reserved and friendly. His parishioners apparently loved him.

As it turns out, Father Miyares had another side to his personality. In October of 2006 a $25 million lawsuit was filed, by a gentleman, against the archdiocese claiming that Miyares and former archdiocesan priest Pedro Jove had fondled and raped him while attending a summer camp at St. Vincent DePaul Seminary in 1981. A second victim stepped forward the following month, claiming that Miyares had fondled him over a period of three years. The Archdiocese of Miami investigated the original allegation, and called in the priest. Miyares, in front of archdiocesan officials, admitted to sexual misconduct calling what he did “mistakes of many years ago.”¹

Mistakes? This man lured a minor to the seminary in Boynton Beach, did unspeakable things to him and then has the gall to call his lewd and illegal actions mistakes? If Miyares had forgotten his contact lenses that night and thought he was having sex with an adult— that could have been construed as a mistake. An improbable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. This man knew exactly what he was doing. His actions demonstrated clear pre-meditation. Using his collar, he exploited this boy, and caused decades of torment and anguish. This was no mistake. It was wrong, immoral, and depraved.

A parochial associate of Miyares gave the homily at the 9:30 AM mass after news of the sexual misconduct broke. Speaking from the altar at Immaculate Conception Church the priest said, “I bow before the person who publicly acknowledges a mistake, something that very few human beings are obligated to do.”² Mistake. Here we go again. You “bow before” a person who has admitted to deviant and illegal behavior with a minor? If anyone should know the difference between a grave immoral act and a mistake, I would hope it would be a priest. Yet, here are two of them that can’t seem to articulate the difference. Thank goodness The Archdiocese of Miami brought a sense of closure and clarity to this unfortunate mess in the form of a press release:

Father Gustavo Miyares has resigned as pastor of Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, effective immediately. This action is the result of a sexual allegation against Father Miyares received by the Archdiocese of Miami on Wednesday, October 4, 2006.

The victim was contacted immediately and pastoral counseling has been offered. An official from the Archdiocese of Miami met with the victim and his wife and, in accordance with our policy regarding sexual abuse, this allegation is being reported to the appropriate state attorney’s office.

On October 6, 2006, Father Miyares met with Archdiocesan officials. It was agreed by all concerned that Father Miyares prepare his parish, his family and his staff for his imminent departure and his resignation. His resignation includes loss of faculties to function publicly as a priest or wear his clerical collar.

It is a sad day when the Catholic Church learns of someone who has been a victim of sexual abuse. We again apologize to this victim and pray that his journey to healing may begin. We are grateful that he has come forward.

The Archdiocese of Miami once again asks if anyone has been a victim of sexual abuse by a member of the clergy or church personnel to come forward by contacting the Archdiocese’s Victims Assistance Coordinator at 1-866-802-2873 or contact your local law enforcement department.³

Cecil Collins was selected in the fifth round by the Miami Dolphins during the Jimmy Johnson years. He already had an arrest record and was on probation when Johnson tapped him to play running back for the franchise. Collins did show promise early on. He was a speedy back who could break tackles. He could also break into women’s apartments and steal things. Amazingly, this is exactly what he did after he signed with the Dolphins. In other words, it wasn’t enough that this guy had just signed a fairly lucrative contract with an NFL team. He had to break into a woman’s apartment and help himself to her belongings.⁴

And what do you suppose he said to the judge after he was arrested for breaking and entering? You guessed it. “I made a mistake.” He subsequently went to prison, thus ending a promising career in the National Football League. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a greater waste of talent. But that talent wasn’t wasted by making a mistake. It would have been a mistake not to pick up the blitzing Will linebacker on third and seven. A mistake would have been running left when the play was designed to go right.

What he did was immoral. It was illegal. It was wrong.

Of course, some are going to say, we’re just arguing semantics here. Many words have shades of meaning that could be subject to varying interpretations. Mistake, I will fully admit, is one of those words. Even The American Heritage College Dictionary, which just happens to be sitting next to me, is no help in this debate.

mis-take n. 1. An error or a fault resulting from defective judgment, deficient knowledge, or carelessness. 2. A misconception or misunderstanding.

Father Miyares’ sexual impropriety could have certainly stemmed from defective judgment. In fact, that would be my best guess. But what about deficient knowledge? In order to believe this, we’d have to assume Miyares learned very little in the area of sexual morality while growing up and, then again, while attending seminary. This I would seriously doubt. He knew exactly what he was doing. He knew it was wrong. He did it anyway. Was he careless? Yes and no. Yes if, by careless, we mean that he did not thoroughly think through his actions, and wantonly exposed others to risk and injury. I would, however, say no if we take careless in the same context as changing a lane without first checking the side and rear view mirrors. That explanation seems a little too casual to me. Yet even with the word careless, we could debate the semantics ad infinitum.

Apparently, this is just what we’re supposed to do with these types of issues. We’re supposed to keep open minds and consider multiple angles. Just listen to how one communication text explains semantics:

…The relationship of language and meaning warn us to avoid a rigid orientation that sees everything as falling into one of two categories of value: good or bad; right or wrong. Instead of approaching the world with this either or, two-valued orientations, we can remember that life is multidimensional and that meanings vary as the backgrounds and experiences of the communicators differ…

We all understand the value of semantics, I’m sure. But where does our desire to consider all relevant angles of a debate leave off and moral relativism begin? There’s a fine line here and, as a culture, we’ve crossed it countless times by being linguistically careless. Can the “I made a mistake” argument cheapen and discount illegal and destructive behavior? Let’s consider the following:

·Your Honor, I made a mistake by killing her. I shouldn’t have done that.

·The United States made a mistake by rounding up Japanese-Americans and putting them into a concentration camp during World War II.

·Nixon made a mistake by erasing those 18 minutes of tape during the Watergate scandal.

·The Enron executives made mistakes by defrauding investors.

·It was a mistake for Bill Clinton to have an affair with Monica Lewinski and lie about it.

·Okay, okay! So I made a mistake! Do you want to crucify me, too?

Mistake, besides becoming an obvious and convenient euphemism, has slipped into the American lexicon and made a cozy home there. It’s like Radon gas. You really have to go out of your way in order to detect it. But it’s there. And it’s doing more harm than you think. In the suspense-thriller, What Lies Beneath, Harrison Ford tells his wife, Claire, (played by Michelle Pfeifer) that he “slipped” and had an affair with an undergraduate. Given the rather casual verbiage, how is Claire supposed to take the news? Okay, honey. As long as it was just a slip.

I made a mistake. We’ve become far too casual with our words. Some pretty awful people are doing some pretty awful things, and mollifying what they’ve done with a casual flick of the tongue. And many of us are letting them off the hook. The collective damage this phrase, and others like it, is doing to our moral fabric may be nigh incalculable. Each of us, however, can do our part by challenging unethical behavior and calling it by its true colors.