After loading my protest signs into my car, I drove straight to the Mt. Angel police station. I didn't know how to protest and wanted to make sure I did everything legally. All I knew, was that I had a civil right to protest, but where and how?
I walked into the police station and the officer at the desk was a "Michael" with a very long and Italian last name. He said I could protest and I told him I didn't want to do it at the Abbey, or on their grounds, but close to the Abbey. So he drew out a map for me of the property boundaries and showed me a cross-street and housing development which came before the driveway up to the Abbey. He said I would be legal if I protested there, as long as it was not blocking off a sidewalk. I thanked him and drove to the location he had specified.
I set out a folding chair and hammered the signs into the ground. I took my book out and began to read, and waited for eggs and rotten tomatoes, but feeling glad someone from the Abbey was going to see me and start asking questions, and knowing it was going to get back to the Abbot.
I wasn't there long at all when people driving by began to stop. They stopped their cars and got out, or pulled alongside the road to talk out the window, and almost every single one passing by was waving, smiling, giving a thumbs up, and one woman drove by yelling, "JUSTICE!!!!!"
I had so many people coming to me, telling me how they were abused by clergy, or how their relative was, or friend, that I was shocked. The town, it seemed, was FILLED with people who had been (usually) sexually abused by clergy. I had adult men telling me things they hadn't told anyone before, they said, at least not to a lawyer or to the police. Almost all of them said it encouraged them to see me out there, taking a stand.
Then I had one or two individuals from the Abbey come down from the hill to find out what I was doing and ask me how long I planned to protest. "I don't know," I said. "What do you want?" they asked. And one or two people drove by glaring at me and shaking their finger. But over 80% of people were positive and showed support.
I had planned to protest one day only, to make a point, but after so many people came forward, saying I had encouraged them, I left that afternoon, feeling I had to go back. Maybe there were more people out there who needed to see a sign of courage and solidarity. And, I started taking phone numbers and names of those who had been abused. I started to wonder what I should do with the information I was being given.
Driving home, after that first day, felt GREAT. I was proud of myself, and more than anything, surprised to find there had been a purpose in it. Maybe God had allowed certain things to happen to me, I thought, or wondered, because only HE knew what my response would be and that I was going to speak up.
I determined to go back the next day.
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