Review: How do you put this into words?
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 02 19, 2012
David Margolick has written an inciteful and complete review of an arch child predators life. Tommy Deary was repeatedly abused by then Father Bernard Bissonnette.  His abuse, like so many others at the hands of predator priests, did not become known or clear until later in his troubled life. Tommy had been an altar boy serving with Bissonnette at St. Mary's church in Putnam, Connecticut.  He had been repeatedly abused while an altar boy there.  His life was forever changed in ways he could not overcome until he was driven to take his life.Bernard Bissonnette was a rapacious pedophile who abused Tommy Deary and many other boys during his lifelong career as a priest.  He was allowed to continue this abuse throughout a long career because the Catholic Church refused to directly confront this horrendous problem.  Instead of being defrocked of his priestly rank he was continually reassigned even to aa boys school near the end of his career.  The Catholic Church of that era chose to simply move about Bissonnette from parish to parish rather than deal with him as a child predator should have been dealt with in any circumstance.  This is an amazing story of betrayal.  Remarkable because it follows the career of one serial child abuser, this book digs into the problem in a way many other books on this repulsive subject fail to do.  This well written book follows the life of Bernard Bissonnette detailing out the ways in which he found boys, groomed them and ultimately repeatedly abused them.  "A Predator Priest" accomplishes this without going into the disgusting detail of the abuse while still clearly documenting what happened to so many boys.  It is a work that places the guilt clearly on Bissonnette while bringing a measure of justice for Tommy Deary that was so needed by his family.Margolick is also able in this book to show how many people simply turned their faces away from the plight of these boys.  He shows clearly how an entire institution abandoned the "least of these", children in it's physical and spiritual care to protect priests who should have been stopped by arrest, prosecution and imprisonment.  The work also makes clear the destruction of lives, faith and families that occurs when child abuse occurs.  Let us hope and pray that this work will help to move the Catholic Church, public schools and other institutions to protect the children instead of the pedophiles. While the Church seems to be more vigilant today one realizes how hidden this crime often is even today.  We see how difficult is actually is for a young man to come forward in the face of abuse.  Let us remain vigilant in the protection of the innocent from abuse in all its horrific forms.