The truth is, I had the tools I needed, and I knew how to use them from an early age. Yet when the time came, they were not enough to help me be heard and be believed.

“This is what abusers do,” they explained. “Everything centers on them. Even when they apologize, they keep the focus on themselves—how they’ve been wronged or what they think they’ve done well—to try to shift the focus away from the pain they’ve caused. They don’t truly take responsibility for anything.” Abusers pass the blame to others, they told

So much work remains. So much evil to fight. So much healing to reach for. So many wounded to love. Consider this your invitation to join in that work. To do what is right, no matter the cost. To hold to the straight line in the midst of the battle. To define your success by faithfulness in the choices you make. The darkness is there, and we cannot

I had to let myself grieve again because grief was the outlet that allowed unhealthy anger to be washed away. And I had to remind myself that longing for what is straight is good. The straight line is there, I told myself. And you can see the evil, because you know the good. Let the grief at what is so crooked turn you to what is straight. I

“And it was not for any medical purpose; is that correct?” “What?” Larry blurted out in confusion and frustration. He had refused to put that in his statements and couldn’t be forced to, because it wasn’t in the statute. I gasped slightly as I realized what the judge was doing. She had the power to ask clarifying questions, and she was requiring

“Sometimes,” one dad had shared, “I haven’t liked the answers God’s given me. Or I haven’t gotten answers at all.” I understood what that was like. “But, you know,” he continued, “I keep going back to the time when Jesus asked Peter if he wanted to walk away—stop following Him. Peter asked, ‘Where else would I go, Lord?’ I gotta ask myself that,

There were bright spots too, like the day Coach Tom Brennan accompanied one of his athletes to the witness stand, and the world got to see what it looked like when an adult responded properly to allegations of abuse.[1] I wanted to cry as I heard Tom explain that he’d been a longtime friend of Larry’s—a colleague, even. Larry was his advisor after

there was no corresponding story about Angie or Andrea, who also took on the cases no one else wanted to take. Nor was there a follow-up piece on the many survivors who had willingly laid out the most horrific thing they’d ever endured, just to keep other children safe. It was yet another example of rape culture at work.

If you can’t prove it, don’t speak up. Because it will cost you everything.