Podcast Show Notes
This is Mike’s third podcast on The Reckoning and listeners are encouraged to listen to the first two interviews and the accompanying show notes to hear how his thinking has evolved,
Mike reflects on the nearly 6 years that have passed since he launched his book, The Catholic Boys on the steps of the Onehunga church where his abuser, Father Frank Green was once parish priest.
He talks about his treatment by the institution that abused him and his subsequent Royal Commission experience and its aftermath as the first faith-based survivor to give evidence in November 2019.
He also describes his struggle to get help through the government system and the life he is living today
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About The Guests
My first priority is that there is change that prevents this happening to other children
Dr Tom Doyle
Mike Ledingham and his brothers, Chris and Gerard, are survivors of the sexual predator, Father Frank Green, when he was diocesan priest at Our Lady of The Assumption, Onehunga, Auckland, New Zealand in the 1950s.
Mike went on to a career in the New Zealand military being a member of the elite SAS.
He and his brothers published an account of this horror, The Catholic Boys (2019)
https://www.bms.co.nz/mike-ledingham-video-interview
and this book was launched on the steps of the same church on June 1 2019
https://i.stuff.co.nz/auckland/113274971/abuse-survivor-plans-trip-to-replace-memorial-ribbons
Mike, an important member of The Network of Survivors of Abuse in Faith-based Institutions and Their Supporters was the first faith-based person to give public testimony at the New Zealand Royal Commission’s Abuse in Care first Contextual Hearing on November 8, 2020 and his stunning testimony can be viewed here:
https://www.abuseincare.org.nz/library/v/79/statement-of-mike-ledingham
Mike continues to advocate fearlessly for justice and redress and demands the Catholic Church accept responsibility for the holocaust of souls it caused and continues to conceal.
About The Host
Murray Heasley
Murray is an advocate and historian for The Network of Survivors of Abuse in Faith-based Institutions and Their Supporters and a founding member of The Reckoning NZ