Author Description

I have written this book because I believe those of us who have been abused by the nuns and priests need to tell our stories so the abuse of children will never happen again. This crime and our shame will never go away until we stand together as one and say to the Catholic Church, 'No more abuse; no more lies; tell the world the truth.' Conceived out of wedlock in 1941, Ann was just two months old when she was placed in the care of a Catholic orphanage in Christchurch, New Zealand. From the beginning, she was taught her mother was sinful and that she would be too unless the devil was beaten from her soul. She was physically and sexually abused by religious and lay staff at the orphanage from an early age and was forced to work long hours on the orphanage farm and later in the laundries. In 1997, when Ann watched a Prime Television documentary exposing the decades of abuse by the Good Shepherd nuns at the Christchurch orphanage, she realised hers wasn't the only lost childhood. Say Sorry documents the abuse inflicted on Ann and its ongoing consequences. It is also the story of her battle to get authorities within the Catholic Church to accept responsibility for the past institutionalised abuse of children and young people in its care; to acknowledge culpability and admit - unconditionally - that there was wrongdoing.