Dopo mesi di polemiche esce in Irlanda il rapporto del Mother and Babies Homes Commission of investigation creato dopo la raccapricciante scoperta delle fosse comuni di 800 infanti nel cortile di una istituzione cattolica di accoglienza di ragazze madri.

Indeed, the report is principally a condemnation of that society – its rigid rules and conventions about sexual matters, its savage intolerance, its harsh judgmentalism, its un-Christian cruelty.

Those seeking to deflect blame from the people and families that made up Irish society onto the religious orders who ran some of the homes will find little encouragement in its pages.

It says that the responsibility for the harsh treatment suffered by the women “rests mainly with the fathers of their children and their own immediate families.”

The prevailing social mores which promoted this practice, the report finds, was “supported and contributed to by the State and the churches”.

‘Brutally misogynistic’

Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman said “the report makes clear that for decades, Ireland had a stifling, oppressive and brutally misogynistic culture, where a pervasive stigmatisation of unmarried mothers and their children robbed those individuals of their agency and sometimes their future”.

Almeno 9000 bambini sono morti nelle mani degli istituti cattolici, con un tasso di mortalità del 15%:

The report notes: “In the years before 1960 mother and baby homes did not save the lives of ‘illegitimate’ children; in fact, they appear to have significantly reduced their prospects of survival. The very high mortality rates were known to local and national authorities at the time and were recorded in official publications.”

Il capo del governo irlandese ha detto che la chiesa dovrebbe scusarsi e gli ordini religiosi rispondere delle loro azioni.

 

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