IRELAND
MSN News
DUBLIN (AP) — Ireland should investigate the Catholic Church’s mistreatment and burial of babies who died decades ago in nun-operated homes for unmarried mothers, a senior church official declared Sunday as the country confronted another shameful chapter of its history of child abuse.
Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin made his appeal following revelations that hundreds of children who died inside a former church-run residence for infants were buried in unmarked graves at the site in western Ireland.
Martin said the probe should have no church involvement, be led by a judge and examine the treatment of children in “mother and baby homes” for unwed mothers and their newborns. These mostly operated in Ireland from the 1920s to 1960s, when Catholic policy and control of social services reached their zenith in post-independence Ireland.
Typically, the women’s families and wider society had shamed and rejected them because of their pregnancies. Babies born inside the institutions were denied baptism and, if they died from the illness and disease rife in such facilities, also denied a Christian burial.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.