Posted on 06/04/2014 9:51:45 PM PDT by boatbums
Almost 800 babies and children were buried in a mass grave in Ireland near a home for unmarried mothers run by nuns, according to new research Wednesday which throws more light on the Irish Catholic Church's troubled past.
Death records suggest 796 children, from newborns to eight-year-olds, were deposited in a grave near a Catholic-run home for unmarried mothers during the 35 years it operated from 1925 to 1961.
Historian Catherine Corless, who made the discovery, says her study of death records for the St Mary's home in Tuam in County Galway suggests that a former septic tank near the home was a mass grave.
The septic tank, full to the brim with bones, was discovered in 1975 by locals when concrete slabs covering the tank broke up.
Until now, locals believed the bones mainly stemmed from the Great Irish famine of the 1840s when hundreds of thousands perished.
St Mary's, run by the Bons Secours Sisters, was one of several such 'mother and baby' homes in early 20th century Ireland.
Thousands of unmarried pregnant women -- labelled at the time as 'fallen women' -- were sent to the homes to have their babies.
The women were ostracised by the conservative-Catholic society and were often forced to hand over their children for adoption.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
That's exactly what I meant.
Just what you wrote.
Yup.
Are you seriously suggesting that somehow this isn’t a scandal at all?
So is “hatred”.
Can I let your families know that you are fine with being buried along with 794 others in a septic tank as long as the name is changed to ‘burial site’? Save some serious cash!
Whatever.
Since this was common knowledge for over 40 years, what makes it a scandal now?
You can observe this by spending some time on ancestry.com.
I already knew about one little aunt who died at 5 weeks—there are many others. Another thing we take for granted in modern life—not as many babies dying or mothers dying in childbirth.
I’m not making excuses for the Church, but we’ll probably never know for sure what happened. Catholic bashers will spin it their way.
I don’t know if I’d go that far.
You imagine I must be "credulous" because I posted a thread that talked about another scandal within the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland? Did they starve or murder these children? Did they not bury 800 babies and young children born in that "home" for unwed mothers in a septic tank? I think the REAL scandal here is the inability of some Roman Catholics to EVER admit people acting in the name of their church could commit terrible things.
How typical to attempt to deflect the subject of the thread by disparaging those who rightfully DO expect answers. Hopefully, there remain some witnesses to what really DID go on there and it, and these little ones, can be respectfully put to rest. Shouldn't that be what faithful Catholics want?
That's because they didn't know the true origin. According to your cited link:
Tuam locals discovered the bone repository in 1975 as cement covering the buried tank was broken away. Before Corless' research this year, they believed the remains were mostly victims of the mid-19th century famine that decimated the population of western Ireland.
1944 government inspection recorded evidence of malnutrition among some of the 271 children then living in the Tuam orphanage alongside 61 unwed mothers. The death records cite sicknesses, diseases, deformities and premature births as causes. This would reflect an Ireland that, in the first half of the 20th century, had one of the worst infant mortality rates in Europe, with tuberculosis rife.
Elderly locals recalled that the children attended a local school — but were segregated from other pupils — until they were adopted or placed, around age 7 or 8, into church-run industrial schools that featured unpaid labor and abuse. In keeping with Catholic teaching, such out-of-wedlock children were denied baptism and, if they died at such facilities, Christian burial.
It is well documented that throughout Ireland in the first half of the 20th century, church-run orphanages and workhouses often buried their dead in unmarked graves and unconsecrated ground, reflecting how unmarried mothers — derided as "fallen women" in the culture of the day — typically were ostracized by society, even their own families. (From http://www.shepherdstownchronicle.com/page/content.detail/id/517531/Irish-church-under-fire-over-children-s-mass-grave.html?isap=1&nav=5134#)
My, my, Narses. Pulling the “class envy” card over THIS??? Aren’t you supposed to be a Conservative? It must mean this scandal has hit a nerve.
I’m just flabbergasted how people will defend any and all actions by their religion no matter how awful.
I, personally, believe that ALL innocents will be covered by the mercy and grace of God and that baptism is for cognizant persons who have received Jesus Christ as Savior and want to publicly testify to their conversion and desire to follow Christ.
Yep. I agree!
The key word in that paragraph is "suggests". Note that the grave has never been excavated, and people are unsure of exactly where it is. I am waiting for proof, on this one.
I sure would.
Boy, the bashers are out tonight, aren’t they? Even when the article is full of conjecture and snide innuendo, the hate just oozes forth.
According to this article, these same mean nuns were trying to find homes in America for these babies.
http://www.viralnova.com/800-babies-mass-grave/?md=3d3ea129b3c7f27aa8c48dd997e3bd0a&ps=8
In rural Western Ireland in the 1920s until the 90s, poverty was endemic. That means little money to feed these children and even less to give them a proper resting place.
Rather than focus on the good these nuns did, looking after the poorest of the poor, you accuse them of starving these children. Do you honestly think they were living in the lap of luxury while these babies died of malnutrition? Where is your proof of that?
FYI, I’m sure that there were mass gravesites in America’s heartland during the Depression that contained the remains of poor people too. The reality is that poverty decreases the health and well-being of its victims, which increases the risk of malnutrition, diseases, premature death, and no money for a headstone.
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