what ever the nuns or priests did to me I knew when I got home my father would do worse. Old school Sicilian.
MY father once told me, hope you don’t go to jail because if they let you out, I’ll kill you.
Right there. Three swats with the “board of education” and you learned not to do it again. Mama saying wait until your daddy gets home was enough to make you wish you could sink into the floor. Three swats with daddy’s belt and you learned not to even think about doing anything close to that. That’s what should have been done to the kid.
My husband said the same thing about his Catholic school education - he saw kids slammed into lockers, a girl picked up off the ground by her hair, a nun slam a window down on a kid’s hand - husband was hit in the back of his head by a board by a priest.
He knew there was no way he could report this at home, it would be 100% his own fault, and punishment from his dad would be far worse.