Madam, - Amid the chorus of self-righteous demonisation of the Catholic Church in general and religious in particular, vis-à-vis the abuse of young people, it was a refreshing change to read the letter in your edition of October 15th, in which the executive officers of Sophia Housing Association, Dublin, and John Griffin, Kells, emphasised the substantial and positive contribution made over the years by religious, and the selfless and thankless work they so patiently performed for little or no reward - work no one else wanted to do.
Yes, unfortunately, there were some bad apples in the barrel. But why blame all for the sins of a few? The enemies of the Catholic Church are having a field day, dredging up all the dirt they can find to blacken all priests, nuns and brothers, shedding copious crocodile tears in the dredging. Schools and hospital authorities have discovered, to their cost, how much unpaid labour actually went into running these establishments, which the State was very happy to let them do.
The State is rightly to blame, in under-funding and under-supervising the orphanages, homes and industrial schools in which unwanted or problem children were placed, out of sight and out of mind. In the context of unmarried mothers, a holier-than-thou society was equally to blame, as were allegedly "respectable" parents, who allowed their daughters to be shut away, rather than face the disgrace of a pregnant, unmarried daughter.
But the real culprits were the males - pillars of society, perhaps - who left unfortunate girls literally holding the babies, their own offspring, that were in those days to be stigmatised as "illegitimate".
Will these terrible wrongs ever be redressed? Will any Tribunal find the many nameless illegitimate fathers, who escaped their responsibilities, and went blameless and scot-free? Of course not. It's still a man's world. - Yours, etc.,
VERA HUGHES,
Moate,
Co Wetmeath.