Shipwrecked in Malta: Part I

Shipwrecked in Malta is a five-part series that recounts one survivor’s experience of homosexual predation and debauchery in religious life. “Elias” is a pseudonym to protect the victim, an attractive man who, since youth, attracted multiple predators. His experiences of corruption are many. This series spotlights a few.

Elias is a survivor of clergy sex abuse. 

A native of Malta, where St. Paul was once shipwrecked and bitten by a viper, Elias was shipwrecked and bitten in Malta by homosexual vipers hiding under the guise of faithful religious.

Elias is an intelligent man who holds two doctoral degrees and teaches. He is scarred from abuse and exposure to a subculture of homosexuals living out the betrayal of their religious vows behind the walls of the seminary and friary.

Although scarred from homosexual predation as a young man, Elias pushes on daily to serve the Lord and help others searching for peace.

In that quest, Elias’ most recent appeal for help from the Vatican proved useless. He informed the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life of his ordeal, hoping, at the very least, they could elicit an apology from his principal abuser, who has never faced consequences for his predation.

The congregation acknowledged Elias has suffered much but has neither censored nor reprimanded his abuser in any way.  

The Vatican’s response made it clear the congregation would do nothing other than offer some platitudes and wish him well on his way.

Fr. Philip Cutajar, OFM

Elias’ ordeal began in the early 1980s. He was young and trusting. 

The Vatican’s response made it clear the congregation would do nothing.

At the age of 15, he went to a teacher for extracurricular help. The teacher, a former deacon, was a homosexual predator who saw the two were alone and fondled Elias. The violation occurred two other times. That teacher was ultimately investigated, found guilty and sent to prison.

Two years later, Elias left his parents for the first time to begin postulancy, the initial stage of Franciscan formation. He assumed his formators would teach him to be a chaste religious.

It was then that he met Fr. Philip Cutajar, his assigned spiritual director. Elias described Cutajar as a good preacher with a charming personality. The postulants respected the friar for his preaching skills and ability to connect with others.

But despite some attraction to Cutajar’s charismatic personality, Elias felt an instinctive fear of the man, who began grooming him early on.

One day, Elias tended to Cutajar, who was running a high fever. He brought the friar lunch and offered him some encouragement.

Sometime later, in violation of canon law, Cutajar began entering Elias’ room, becoming overly familiar through seemingly innocuous touching that made Elias uncomfortable.

The room visits continued, and the grooming progressed to lying on the postulant’s bed and forcing kisses on him. Elias did not welcome the kisses but felt trapped.

Cutajar was well-known. He was treated as a kind of guru among the students. And as the general director of the province, many valued and admired him for bringing in new vocations. Every week, Cutajar’s room was filled with new young men interested in the Franciscans — though some seemed more interested in an easy career and unholy pursuits.

The aftermath of abuse left Elias terrified.

Elias once caught two postulants engaged in homosexual activity with each other and was asked not to say anything. One of the two involved became a priest and then changed denominations three times. Now married with children, he is a priest for one of the three personal ordinariates created by the Holy See in 2012 for Anglicans who become Catholics.

Confusion and Aftermath

Cutajar was a hodgepodge of contradictions. As Elias’ spiritual director, Cutajar knew the young man avoided masturbation against the virtue of chastity and even encouraged him to keep his hands pure for the priesthood. But that encouragement did not stop the friar from escalating his grooming, which ultimately led to salacious comments and the inappropriate touching of his genitals.

One time, Cutajar abused Elias so violently that the postulant screamed in pain and had to apply therapeutic cream thereafter. The homosexual predator tried once to sodomize Elias, but he bit the friar’s hand, forcing him to stop.

The aftermath of abuse left Elias terrified and filled with guilt. 

But spiritual direction continued. Elias would tell Cutajar of his guilt and desire to stop, but the friar would treat the concerns as nothing, saying this was merely love. In addition, Cutajar would give Elias sacramental absolution — itself a serious sin and a canonical crime in which one excommunicates himself.

Canon 977 states: “The absolution of an accomplice in a sin against the sixth commandment of the Decalogue [Ten Commandments] is invalid except in danger of death.”

Elias was devastated. His pursuit of holiness seemed irreparably shattered, but he decided to continue with formation.

But the vipers were not going anywhere.

— Campaign 31540 —

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