{"id":12795,"date":"2021-11-28T03:03:38","date_gmt":"2021-11-28T11:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=12795"},"modified":"2021-11-30T03:07:00","modified_gmt":"2021-11-30T11:07:00","slug":"phil-saviano-clergy-abuse-victim-who-refused-to-stay-silent-dies-at-69-the-boston-globe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/?p=12795","title":{"rendered":"“Phil Saviano, clergy abuse victim who refused to stay silent, dies at 69”, The Boston Globe"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/span> B<\/span>ryan Marquard, Globe Staff, November 28, 2021<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Rejecting a confidentiality agreement, he inspired others to tell their stories<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\"Mr.Mr. Saviano played a critical part in uncovering the church coverup of sexual abuse of minors.\u00a0<\/span>DAVID L. RYAN\/GLOBE STAFF\/FILE\/2016<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Phil Saviano was near death from AIDS three decades ago and thousands of dollars in debt when the Worcester Diocese tried to silence him with a settlement that would have prevented him from publicly revealing that he had been sexually abused by a priest when he was a boy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI just couldn\u2019t agree to it,\u201d Mr. Saviano told the Globe in 1995. \u201cI knew if I did I would just be contributing to their campaign to look away and shut everybody up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

By refusing to sign a confidentiality agreement, he received a smaller settlement that kept him in financial peril. But his principled stand became a landmark moment in victims\u2019 efforts to expose the Catholic Church\u2019s worldwide history of covering up the abuse of children.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Mr. Saviano<\/a>, whose personal story and precise documentation of priests who assaulted children helped inform The Boston Globe\u2019s Pulitzer Prize-winning coverage of the clergy sexual abuse crisis, was 69 when he died Sunday at his brother\u2019s home in Douglas.<\/span><\/p>\n

RELATED: <\/span>\u2018They knew and they let it happen\u2019: Uncovering child abuse in the Catholic Church<\/a><\/div>\n
\n
\"\u201cHe
\u201cHe was a true survivor, and I think through his story he gave other victims a blueprint for how to turn this trauma into something empowering,\u201d Anne Barrett Doyle, codirector of BishopAccountability.org, said of Mr. Saviano, shown in 2012. <\/span>BARRY CHIN\/GLOBE STAFF\/THE BOSTON GLOBE<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Along with emotionally surviving the sexual abuse inflicted on him, he had lived for years with an HIV diagnosis, a kidney transplant, and more recently gallbladder cancer that spread to the liver.<\/span><\/p>\n

Through it all he became one of the most internationally prominent voices among victims seeking justice, even traveling to Rome in 2019<\/a> to meet with Vatican officials before they met in a conference about clergy sex abuse.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not an exaggeration to say that Phil\u2019s impact has been global,\u201d said Anne Barrett Doyle<\/a>, codirector of BishopAccountability.org<\/a>, which tracks allegations against priests.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe was also a man who triumphed<\/a>,\u201d she said. \u201cHe was a true survivor, and I think through his story he gave other victims a blueprint for how to turn this trauma into something empowering.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Working first with church documents about his own case that he obtained through his court actions, Mr. Saviano became a meticulous keeper of records as he listened to the stories of countless victims who sought his help and valued his counsel.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI quickly became a repository of horror stories, offering support and advice to victims calling from all over the country,\u201d he said in a 2002 speech<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first misdeeds he publicized<\/a> were those of the Rev. David Holley, who had sexually assaulted him in St. Denis Church in Douglas, a small town south of Worcester.<\/span><\/p>\n

By reaching out to reporters and to organizations that also were gathering information, and by founding the New England Chapter of SNAP \u2014 the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests \u2014 Mr. Saviano helped set off what became a flood of public accusations throughout the state, across the country, and around the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn a true sense, that information explosion can be traced back to Phil, and Phil\u2019s case, and Phil\u2019s experience as a little 11-year-old boy in a tiny Massachusetts town,\u201d said Terence McKiernan<\/a>, founder and codirector of BishopAccountability.org<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPhil\u2019s experience isn\u2019t just an individual experience or a Massachusetts experience,\u201d McKiernan said. \u201cIt has become a universal experience.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But when Mr. Saviano first went public in 1992, he thought he might soon die.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf I had not been dying of AIDS, I would not have had the courage to come forward, but at that point my career was over, I was on my way out physically, my reputation was shot in the eyes of many people, and I didn\u2019t have a lot to lose,\u201d he recalled in a 2009<\/a> Globe interview. \u201cThis was a final opportunity to effect some change and address this thing that happened to me when I was a kid.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

When the advent of protease inhibitors to treat HIV\/AIDS prolonged Mr. Saviano\u2019s life, he kept speaking out until the end through a series of health issues.<\/span><\/p>\n

Not least among them was a crisis on that night in 2016 when \u201cSpotlight,\u201d the movie based on the Globe\u2019s clergy sex abuse coverage, won the Academy Award for best picture.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Los Angeles for the ceremony, Mr. Saviano accidently injured himself while administering medication in a shot to his abdomen. Bleeding internally, he went to a hospital, where a doctor thought his life was ebbing away.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe doctor said, \u2018I have to check you in,\u2019 and Phil said, \u2018I have to go to this show. We have to show that a survivor is there, and I\u2019m going to be there one way or another,\u2019 ” recalled the singer Judy Collins<\/a>, a longtime friend who was performing elsewhere in Los Angeles that night.<\/span><\/p>\n

When the best picture was announced, Mr. Saviano joined the film\u2019s director, producers, actors, and Globe reporter Michael Rezendes<\/a> on stage<\/a> \u2014 more than 50 years after those frightening childhood encounters he had endured in the St. Denis Church basement.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once again, he had lived to ensure that victims were recognized, though he hastened to the hospital moments after sharing the Oscar spotlight.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPhil is a real, real survivor. That\u2019s his genius,\u201d said the actor Neal Huff, who was with him at the Academy Awards and portrayed<\/a> Mr. Saviano in the film. \u201cHe\u2019s one of the greats of our time. He truly is.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Philip James Saviano was born on June 23, 1952, a son of Pasquale Saviano, an electrician, and Mary Bombara Saviano, who had worked as a secretary before raising the couple\u2019s four sons.<\/span><\/p>\n

Growing up on a dead-end street in Douglas, the boys were walking distance from a river where they went fishing and a pond for skating in the winter.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe were all very much nature\u2019s children,\u201d said Mr. Saviano\u2019s older brother Jim, who still lives in Douglas. \u201cMy parents had no fear of us going into the woods and coming back after dark.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Young Phil was a paperboy, which brought him into regular contact with Holley. Those early terrifying experiences are highlighted in a tentative title for Mr. Saviano\u2019s memoir, which he was working on even in his final days: \u201cSpilling Secrets: From Newsboy to Spotlight.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI lost my faith before I\u2019d even gone through puberty. For over a year, I struggled with a priest who cornered me every chance he got,\u201d Mr. Saviano wrote in remarks he prepared for a searing, healing speech he delivered in Boston in 2002 at the first national convention of the Voice of the Faithful.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere are things that I remember even today \u2014 the coolness of the dark church basement; the smell of his sickly, sweet cologne; the beads of sweat on his forehead; the force of his hands around my skinny wrist,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I remember the most, however, is the confusion,\u201d Mr. Saviano added. \u201cI worried greatly that year, about sin and about forgiveness. How could I disobey God\u2019s emissary on earth?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

It was only as an adult that he would break through the struggle and speak out, though among the traits and talents he brought to rising up against the church was his even demeanor.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t remember a moment of rancor or bitterness from Phil over all the tribulations that were visited upon him by the actions of the Catholic Church,\u201d said Walter Robinson<\/a>, who led the Globe Spotlight Team\u2019s investigation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Saviano also had an innate gift for public relations.<\/span><\/p>\n

The third of four brothers, he graduated from Douglas Memorial High School, received a bachelor\u2019s degree in zoology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and a master\u2019s in communications from Boston University.<\/span><\/p>\n

Hired as assistant public relations director at Faulkner Hospital, he soon became director. While coordinating fund-raising, he arranged for a 1982 benefit concert at Symphony Hall featuring Judy Collins.<\/span><\/p>\n

Leaving Faulkner, he launched Special Delivery Productions, his concert promotion company, working on shows by artists such as Diahann Carroll, Barbara Cook, Laura Nyro, and Ella Fitzgerald, whom he once helped back to a chair on Symphony Hall\u2019s stage in 1985 after she was treated for an ankle injury she suffered in a tumble early in the performance.<\/span><\/p>\n

Among those whose concerts he promoted, Collins was Mr. Saviano\u2019s closest friend. \u201cHe\u2019s so special to me,\u201d she said by phone in October.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a family member. There\u2019s no other way to put it,\u201d Collins said. \u201cWe have had so many things in our friendship, so many wonderful talks, and so many triumphs. He was around for a lot of the good things and bad things in my life.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That included when her son, Clark, died by suicide in 1992 and she went on to write the 2003<\/a> book \u201cSanity and Grace: A Journey of Suicide, Survival, and Strength.\u201d Collins said she could speak with Mr. Saviano at times when it seemed impossible to speak with anyone else.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m honored to be able to speak for my friend,\u201d she said of Mr. Saviano. \u201cI\u2019ve got a song called \u2018Communion\u2019 that\u2019s absolutely based on Phil\u2019s life. I will get it recorded someday.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\"Mr.
Mr. Saviano (third from left) joined members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP) in front of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, in 2011. The group was protesting that no high-ranking Roman Catholic leaders had been prosecuted for sheltering guilty priests.<\/span>ROB KEERIS\/ASSOCIATED PRESS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

In August 2001, soon after the Globe\u2019s then-new editor Martin Baron<\/a>\u00a0instructed the Spotlight Team to make investigating allegations against priests its top priority, Mr. Saviano visited the reporters to offer what he called<\/a> \u201ca graduate-level seminar in clergy abuse.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWhen he finished, there was a stunned silence in the room. I think we were all simmering with rage \u2014 there\u2019s no other way to put it,\u201d Rezendes recalled.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe gave us a much-needed tutorial,\u201d Robinson said. \u201cI think until that moment, we didn\u2019t have a sense that what we were looking at was in any way as big a scandal as it became.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Mr. Saviano was \u201cmore than just an abuse survivor and advocate and inspirational figure,\u201d said David Clohessy<\/a>, former national director of SNAP.<\/span><\/p>\n

Through countless conversations with survivors and the way he encouraged many of them to take on more significant public roles, Mr. Saviano played an incalculable role in the movement to combat clergy sex abuse.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really hard to even estimate not only the number of survivors he comforted, but the number of survivors he guided to become leaders in their own right, Clohessy said.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to his brother Jim, Mr. Saviano leaves his brothers John of Douglas and Victor of Dorchester.<\/span><\/p>\n

A funeral Mass will be said for Mr. Saviano but plans were not immediately available.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe is a hero to our family,\u201d Jim said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Among Mr. Saviano\u2019s close friends, one who became a de facto relative, was Susan Pavlak of Minnesota, who donated a kidney<\/a> in 2009 to keep him alive.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHis persistence in pursuing the information, and his civility, has changed the face of the Catholic Church,\u201d said Pavlak, who as a girl was molested<\/a> by her high school religion teacher, a former nun.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\"Mr.
Mr. Saviano with his kidney donor, Susan Pavlak, in 2019. <\/span>BARRY CHIN\/GLOBE STAFF\/THE BOSTON GLOBE<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

\u201cPhil was a symbol of healing and triumph for the survivor community that could not have been accomplished in a more mythic way, in my view,\u201d she said. \u201cPlus he earned it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

A collector of Mexican folk art and an inveterate traveler, Mr. Saviano encouraged abuse victims \u2014 and everyone, really \u2014 to \u201cfind something that you enjoy, that brings joy to yourself, whether it\u2019s music, cooking, gardening. I feel that we only go around once in life, and we should try to make the most of it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In a phone conversation earlier this month, he offered final words of advice to victims everywhere \u2014 to do as he did, to speak out.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cLet go of the silence,\u201d he said. \u201cIt hurts nobody but yourself.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bryan Marquard, Globe Staff, November 28, 2021 Rejecting a confidentiality agreement, he inspired others to tell their stories Mr. Saviano played a critical part in uncovering the church coverup of sexual abuse of minors.\u00a0DAVID L. RYAN\/GLOBE STAFF\/FILE\/2016 Phil Saviano was near death from AIDS three decades ago and thousands of dollars in debt when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1001004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1001004"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12795"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12797,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12795\/revisions\/12797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldcampaign.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}