2023-06-20 23:24:42
A request for collective action concerning all the victims who would have been assaulted by a member or an employee of the Diocese of Joliette was authorized a week ago, in particular because of the support of survivors like Patrick Pichette.
The 55-year-old man recounts having been touched almost daily by a priest, from the age of 6, when he was a mass server near Joliette.
“For me, I was small, I didn’t have an alarm to say it wasn’t right. Anyway, it was Monsieur le Curé, so it was okay, he said. It always started with wandering hands on the thighs. And then less so that it was the summer period, we were in shorts, well, the hands were found inside the shorts.
The abuse stopped around the age of 11, when he confided in his mother.
About forty years have passed, but the consequences are still very present.
“It’s a scar that remains for life,” he continues. From the moment you accept the scar, you can’t remove it. That’s one thing. Then you have to decide what to do with it. But it always goes up. As soon as I meet a new person, it will go up. All the time.”
When he learned that a request for collective action, which concerns the period from 1940 to today, was filed once morest the Diocese of Joliette, he decided to add his voice to it.
“Me, I managed to get by with pretty much all my songs. I have known people who have unfortunately committed suicide, says Mr. Pichette. I have known two people who committed suicide because of it. There is one who has fallen into the world of drugs, unfortunately; then the other person committed suicide. I don’t want that to happen to other people.”
The Diocese of Joliette says it does not wish to grant an interview for the moment so as not to interfere with the negotiations in progress.
Watch the full report in the video above.
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