Karl Schembri's 'Eħlisna mid-Deni' has won this year's National Book Prize. It is a story about clerical abuse, which, though fictional, draws much from Karl Schembri's own family history.

Twenty years ago, Karl Schembri's mother was murdered by his mentally ill father, a tragedy with roots in the clerical sexual abuse suffered by Karl's father when he was still a child, at a time when speaking out against a priest was “unthinkable”, Schembri told Times Talk.

“For a long time, I couldn’t put my story into words. I didn’t even know where to begin. My dad killed my mum – how do you even begin to explain that?”

“When my father tried to speak to his family, they wouldn’t believe him. And the Church was much more powerful then, which enabled much more to go under the radar.”

“His case was never believed, never even became a case, and justice was never done,” he said.

“The Church, for many years, suppressed these cases and reassigned problematic priests across different roles to silence the scandal. Worse still, some were transferred into positions with direct access to children, even when their abusive potential was known, an act nothing short of diabolical.”

Karl Schembri, a a former MaltaToday editor, dedicated his award to victims of the clerical abuse and to “all those who were humiliated and silenced by the Church, by the State, and even by our courts”.

“Because the courts, when all is said and done, administer the law, not justice,” he said.

Sources:

https://timesofmalta.com/article/watch-father-killed-mum-abuse-illness-book-seeks-justice.1119271

https://www.maltatoday.com.mt/arts/books/144621/schembri_wins_national_book_prize_calls_for_clerical_abuse_inquiry