Deliver us from evil

Colm O'Gorman

When Colm O'Gorman was five he was abused by the person he and his family trusted most in the world; their parish priest.

Colm, 42, says the early 1970s was a time when the world was ignorant about child abuse.

His family later moved away from the little village near Wexford, south-east Ireland, into the town and he suffered at the hands of a priest once again during his teens.

That priest was Father Sean Fortune and he later committed suicide in 1999 while on bail facing 29 charges of serious sexual assaults on young boys.

Colm joined Jumoke Fashola to talk at length about his experiences and why he finally decided to make Ireland sit up and listen.

He discussed how it shaped him to make him the man he is today, how he has made sense of his life and what made him eventually speak out and then sue the Church.

"What I experienced hurt and devastated me but it also hurt and devastated my family, not least because they felt and had, I suppose, a responsibility for me."

But Colm says his book is about hope, triumph over adversity and compassion.

Beyond Belief is published by Hodder & Stoughton.