"Forget the injustices of the past," the author was told. He persisted.
By Jim Graham
On November 28, 1993, my wife, Melodie, dropped a bombshell. We were having dinner at the elegant Aqua restaurant in San Francisco, 2,200 miles from our home in Oyster Bay Cove, New York. “I’m going to tell you something you’ll find disturbing,” she said over cocktails. “John Graham was not your father. Your father was Father Thomas Sullivan, a Catholic priest.” I heard her statement as if it were a line in a novel, not part of a conversation between two ordinary people over dinner. She looked at me as though she feared my reaction, so I took her seriously. “When your mother left Buffalo with you as a toddler, the priest accompanied you,” she went on. “He was domiciled at Holy Angels Parrish in Buffalo. Private detectives were hired, and the three of you were located 10 months later.”
That conversation ignited my 25-year journey for the truth — a truth kept from me for 48 years. My wife had no other details to offer. The information was given to her by an individual I thought was my cousin. As my story unfolded, I discovered I’m not related to the family in whose household I was raised, nor was I adopted by them. A scheme to hide my true origin was orchestrated by the church to save them from scandal during a conservative time in our history, post-World War II.
John Graham, the man I called Dad, died suddenly of a massive heart attack in 1979 at the age of 69. He divorced my mother in 1948, when I was just three, and never remarried. During my childhood, my mother lived in New York City, while I lived with John Graham and his family in Buffalo. The scheme was designed to make it appear as though I were the third child of John and Helen (O’Connell) Graham, when, in reality, I was the son of a priest. All the principals (Graham, my mother, and my father) died without having told me. The power the church exerted over these individuals as they took the secret to their graves is stunning.
I never would have known what I’m sharing now if it hadn’t been for an act of retribution toward me. Earlier in 1993, I had disparaged the name of John Graham in a conversation with a member of his family. Graham treated me poorly throughout my childhood, and as a result I left his household at age 18 in 1963. My comments circled back to Otto, Graham’s brother, whom I always thought was my uncle. In defense of his brother, Otto broke the church’s code of silence that others had honored for half a century. He had attempted to hurt me, but in retrospect, I see he gave me a gift. The reason for the dysfunction I experienced as a child had become clear.
I sensed uncovering the coverup wouldn’t be easy. The first place I looked for answers was with the Graham family. I met with Otto and his sister Kathryn, whom I had believed to be my aunt. The church likely advised them how to deal with me at the meeting as they attempted to put the toothpaste back in the tube. Kathryn uttered a well-rehearsed talking point as she slid a newspaper obituary across the kitchen table and said, “This man may be your father, but only the principals know, and they are dead.” Although the man in the photo was much older than I was, his eyes, nose, lips, and chin were startlingly familiar. Otto and Kathryn offered no further information.
The more I was denied my history, the more adamant I became about claiming it. I eventually knocked on the doors of my father’s order, the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
A priest I encountered, Father Savage, a contemporary of my father, said, “Whatever we discuss in this room will stay in this room.”
“Then you know,” I said.
“Yes, I know.”
“How do you know?”
“You look just like him!” he admitted.
My wife, who attended this meeting, winced at Father Savage’s closing statement: “Forget the injustices of the past. You are relatively young and you have good genes, so get on with the rest of your life.” This cruel comment — his way of saying “get on your way and don’t come back” — only fueled my desire to know more.
It was inconceivable to me that the church denied my mother and me our basic human rights. They took me from her when I was a toddler and ensured I would never know my father. We were pawns in their self-serving, scandal-saving plot and were swept under the rug. Following the revelation, I had a new purpose in life: to expose the power and corruption of the institution that trampled on our lives.
For years, I followed the paper trail, collecting a treasure trove of documents. I interviewed numerous priests, nuns, and laity on my journey. Those who knew my father were stunned by my likeness to their old friend. I witnessed a thread of fear running throughout members of the church, each afraid to be known as the whistle-blower. Even today, a 100-year-old nun who told me much about my history wishes to remain anonymous, fearing she’ll discredit her order. I’ve twice written the superior general of the order, domiciled in Rome, offering him the opportunity as a leader of the church to do the right thing — to be transparent. The responses were terse, likely drafted by a canon lawyer: “We have no records of Father T.S. Sullivan fathering a child.”
On January 8, 2018, I had a phone conversation with the provincial of the USA Oblate Order, Fr. Louis Studer. Like Father Savage, he was not pastoral. He badgered me over and over during our call, repeating, “You think you’re Father Sullivan’s son, but you can’t prove it.” Years ago, I‘d thought about asking permission to exhume Thomas Sullivan’s body to prove he was my father, but I quickly dismissed the thought, assuming the Oblate Order would have thought I was grandstanding. Plus, I knew it wouldn’t allow it anyway. But after staring down the church for 25 years, and following my heated phone conversation with Fr. Studer, I wrote to the provincial requesting an exhumation. To my surprise, two weeks later, my request was granted, provided the exhumation would be at my expense and there would be no photos or filming and no press on the Tewksbury, Massachusetts cemetery grounds. To this day, I don’t believe the church thought I would go through with it.
On June 18, 2018, the day after Father’s Day, I had my father’s body exhumed for a DNA comparison. The results came back 99.999% positive that Father Thomas Sullivan was my father. Not surprisingly, I have not heard from the Oblate hierarchy since. What could they say to a man who looks like Father Sullivan and who spent 25 years knocking on their door? What could they say after an exhumation when we both knew what the results would be?
To my knowledge, I’m the only son of a priest in the world to have had his father’s remains exhumed to prove paternity.
— Jim Graham, who lives with his wife, Melodie, in Seneca, South Carolina, is writing a memoir about his quest to find the truth. Follow his story on Twitter @jim_jimgraham45 and https://www.facebook.com/jim.graham.7739814 and listen to him discuss his journey on “Family Secrets with Dani Shapiro.” Access the episode at https://www.familysecretspodcast.com/podcasts/the-very-image.htm
