Sandra & Valentina, Argentina

Laia Abril, On Rape, 2022

Narrator: When you feel this denigrated and oppressed, shame and frustration become your everyday. We lived in constant fear. When we were together everything was more bearable because it was our vocation to become nuns. A dream we would not be able to pursue if we reported her, she would make sure we remembered that. She would punish us day and night with hard tasks. She would hold us responsible for her own sins and force us to wash them away through self-harm until we bled. We would feel isolated from the world, we could not hold hands, show affection, or create deep friendships with any other novices. She would constantly remind us that no one would believe us. She would convince us that it was our fault, “our porcelain skin” would be to blame. But, as our Mother Superior, she was supposed to protect us, to take care of us, to keep vigil over this group of minors she was in charge of. But instead, at night we trembled, thinking of whether we would be the next victim. After years of fighting for justice, she was not prosecuted but, in effect, society sentenced her: the support of those around us who believed in us forced her to change identity and flee the country.