Sir, - Over the past decade now we have seen books about life in certain industrial schools. Three TV programmes on the same theme captured wide attention, and now we have yet another book. Examples of child abuse are featured, and many of these involved are members of religious orders. Understandably, by now readers and viewers have a one-sided idea of what life was like in such institutions.
There were over 50 industrial schools in this country in addition to a number of other homes and orphanages, yet the authors and TV producers deal only with a certain few. Why? Even if all the stories highlighted are true, is it not also true that: (a) not every institution was in the category as those portrayed; and (b) caring and kindness and dedication abounded in many others? Surely in the interest of balance some of these industrial schools should have featured also. But the authors and TV producers apparently felt that they were outside their remit, or perhaps that they were better reserved for separate treatment another day. If so, we're still waiting. The result is that there is abroad in the public mind at present a distorted impression of what life was like generally in industrial schools between the 1920s and the 1960s.
This needs to be put right, and maybe RTE with its larger role and wider audience should do something about it. It won't be easy, because there is a strong current of anti-clericalism to swim against in this particular regard, some of which unwittingly (maybe) was of RTE's own making. Such a probe, I am confident, would reveal that the vast majority of those in religious orders were God-fearing men and women of true Christian vocation who gave a lifetime of loving care and kindness to thousands of homeless orphans, to children from broken homes, to children born outside marriage and to the unwanted young rejects of society.
Most of the nuns and brothers have passed on, but it pleases modern society to ignore the extraordinary impact for good which they left behind. There are thousands of people alive today who received a good education from the nuns and brothers, to whom they owe a debt of gratitude which can never be repaid, for no thanks could possibly be adequate. The least we can do,however, is acknowledge it. But why the deafening silence? - Yours, etc.,
Joe Dunne, Villa Park Gardens, Dublin 7.