May 20, 2009
Is this supposed to be “shocking” or something? (Yours truly grew up with the ruler-wielding nuns of the “Magdalene Sisters” order — the ironically-named Sisters of Mercy — exported to the United States.) Still, we’re glad the report is out:
Thousands raped and abused
in Catholic schools in IrelandThe shocking scale of sexual and physical abuse in educational institutions in Ireland run by the Catholic church was revealed today in a report describing how thousands of boys and girls were raped, abused and exploited by the religious brothers and nuns who were supposed to look after them.
The 2,600-page report by Ireland’s Commission to Inquire Into Child Abuse found that for decades rape was “endemic” in more than 250 Irish Catholic care institutions from the 1930s to the 1990s, and that the church in Ireland protected paedophiles in its ranks from arrest. …
“A climate of fear, created by pervasive, excessive and arbitrary punishment, permeated most of the institutions and all those run for boys. Children lived with the daily terror of not knowing where the next beating was coming from,” it said.
Children in industrial schools and reformatories were treated more like convicts and slaves than people with human rights, it said. Rape was particularly common in boys homes and industrial schools run by the Christian Brothers. …
More at The Guardian.
[...] also: “2,600-Page Report Released on Endemic Abuse in Irish Catholic Schools,” May 21, [...]