The History of The Irish...Worldwide
Is $34.5 Million Enough for Ireland's Magdalene Victims?
What do you think of the Irish government's announcement yesterday that it would provide the estimated 770 living victims of Catholic Church-run Magdalene laundries at least $34.5 million to compensate them for their months and years, even decades of forced labor?
In remarks to former Magdalenes, Justice Minister Alan Shatter apologized to the women and said he hoped they would accept the government's compensation plans as "a sincere expression of the state's regret for failing you in the past, its recognition of your current needs, and its commitment to respecting your dignity and human rights as full, equal members of our nation."
Here's some related information:
Ireland to pay $45 million to Catholic laundry workers (CBS News)
Irish Cillini and Magdalene Laundry Panel with Linda Evangelista, Toni Maguire, Mari Steed, Gerry Regan
'The Magdalene Sisters' Hits America's Shores
Tags: Faith, Magdalenes
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Mari Steed on
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You actually did have a chance to make a claim, up until September 2011.
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Permalink Reply by Bernard Raymond O'Brien on
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Geez, I cannot believe this. I was beaten but everybody was, so its ok. Geeez.
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I don't know if he is a "Mr." OD. Very similar defensive rhetoric as that we have heard, heard, heard from many priests and religious.
For myself, the discussion here is by, for, and about those of us within the Catholic Church who have felt left, left out, and insignificant by Church leaders. Such arrogance. Such lack of humility. Such lack o
f self awareness. Such poor preparation for their supposedly Godly assignments, Their is nothing about the priesthood that can't be changed by changing almost all the rules for recruitment of priests; celibacy a good start for reforming.
Or it will be the Churches' demise. Thats what makes the Lutheran and Episcopal Churches today; exactly, they looked at celibay and said IMPOSSIBLE.
Its hard to have hope with the same ol men keeping such rules in place, and to vote for tolerance and understanding for gays and lesbians.
Yep, the Church has already demised us; its just a matter of time, but too much time.
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As I pointed out in my original post, if you are at all familiar with the Stanford Prison Experiment (http://www.prisonexp.org/), you'll know how easy it is for rational, "good" people to turn into "monsters". The set-up for the nuns was an all-too-easy one. These were women who were held up (and believed themselves) to be paragons of virtue and were given "care" of marginalised, poor or otherwise vulnerable members of society, whom they believed to be "faulty" in some way, either morally or mentally. They believed themselves to be superior to the women in their care, and it doesn't take long for that sense of superiority to devolve into seeing their charges as sub-human. From there it's a short, slippery slope to abuse. The smug "Sisters A and B" provided ample evidence of that sense of superiority in their recent radio interview.
One needs no "agenda" to understand how easily human beings can turn into monsters.
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Nice description Mari of something terribly not nice. The members of the Church set up the priesthood and religious to believe they were superior; intimidated all but a few and felt entitled to insult and verbally abuse. My mother and Dad, born in late 1800s vouched for that. I once saw my mother, a strong and assertive woman usually, bow and scrape to a nun, and always defer to any priest.
We must quit admitting emotionally disturbed persons into the priesthood and religious life, and stopping celibacy is as first absolutely needed step. Also, members of our Church must over rule the Vatican and insist on the full acceptance of gays and lesbians.
Of course we are decades behind other religions, like Episcopal and many Lutheran and Methodist churches.
Its time to quit following these emotionally bent dictums of the Church --- enforced by chest beating priests who care not how many thousands of good families they harm, often irrevocably; most unaware, totally, of their own sickness.
All priests and nuns bad. Of course not. But a huge majority who accepted things as they found them, followed orders, learned to hide, etcf.
How many priests have you known who have gone to the AP in the last 50 years and were open about pedaphilia, alcoholism, sexual problems, virulent prejudices, and serious mental health disturbances rampant, abuse of students, of persons entrusted to their care? All by not reporting were/are guilty, period. It may have hurt their mothers' feelings to do this, to leave a very sick Church, but that's what they needed to do. For us all. For God's sake.
Not helpi in the cover up all these years. And support the Status Quo.
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Good people do good things. Bad people do bad things. But for good people to do bad things, that takes religion!
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The nuns didn't keep places clean. The women who worked/slaved for them did. If you for one minute believe that a nun ever picked up a mop and bucket in any of those places, you're sadly mistaken.So let's be careful with language: it wasn't the nuns doing the cleaning - it was those they ordered.
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Permalink Reply by Rónán Gearóid Ó Domhnaill on
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People were used to hard work back then.The nuns did however do the cleaning in the hospitals which they kept spick and span. The nuns led a hard life and they themselves were seldom let out.Mullan reduces them all to a simplistic stereotype in his movie.
The nuns did not view the penitents as any more inferior than society did. Even today prostitutes, of which many penitents were in the thirties, are shunned by society.
The image portrayed is that once you went in, you were locked away for life, which is simply not true. The only reason there were older penitents there was that they had nowhere else to go. The nuns provided them with the only home they could expect to have.
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You offer many generous excuses for those who abused these women. You keep repeating statements that have been proven false. You admit that these women, whom you scornfully call Maggies, could only leave "if they were collected", and when they were not? Also you repeat that the nuns and priests were part of a larger society that condemned all things sexual (though you would not use that "sex" word!) This societal attitude was the result of the sick, unnatural, self hating teaching of the Catholic Church! Stop excusing the inexcusable. Can't you leave that to the Pope?
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if they were not collected whose fault was that? I don't know about America, but in Ireland we tend to be prudish about matters of the flesh, just like in Britain.
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Ireland was never prudish about matters of the flesh until they subjugated themselves to the Roman Church. It was all downhill from there.
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Whose fault was that, you ask. Surely it was not the fault of the imprisoned women. Why were they not allowed to leave? Why do you believe it was necessary for someone to "collect" them? Had they been paid for their work, instead of being used as slaves, they would have had a small nest egg to start a new life. Sir, will you please stop repeating that Ireland and England were both "prudish", and acknowledge that the Catholic Church taught both that the body was dirty, that women were sources of temptation, and that sex was sin. How similar is the nun's habit to the burka?
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