Catholic Health Australia regrets adoption policy

[doggie]

Catholic Health Australia regrets adoption policy

Published: Jul 24, 2011 9:53 PM

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) - Roman Catholic Church health providers have apologized for forcing unmarried Australian mothers to give up their babies for adoption and are urging state governments to accept financial responsibility for the once widespread practice.

Catholic Health Australia, the largest nongovernment hospital operator in Australia, said in a statement Monday that the practice of adopting out children of unwed mothers to married couples was "regrettably common" from the 1950s to the 1970s.

Catholic Health Australia chief executive Martin Laverty said the apology was calculated to "speed up the federal government into action" to establish a national program funded by states to help mothers and children who were harmed by the forced separations.

[ladypuglover]

It did happen here in the US. I know a woman who when she had her first born in the mid 60's as an unwed teen mother, her baby was removed by force and she has never seen her baby again.

[Kitten]

So, if the Roman Catholic church was forcing these adoptions, why should the STATE accept financial responsibility for any reparations? I'm not familiar with the history here - did the government threaten the RC church somehow if it didn't force these women to surrender their children? Did the government dictate this policy to all healthcare providers, or just the RC group? How is this now the government's responsibility?

[LadyBBR]

Has anyone seen the movie The Magdalene Sisters? It is based on what happened in Ireland, all the way up through 1996! Women who had babies out of wedlock were locked away in laundries to work forever as penence. Also, women who were raped, deemed too sexy, too outspoken were locked away there too. I was flabbergasted when I found out about this, but even more so that it when on until the late 1990s!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magdalene_asylum

[Alecto]

So, if the Roman Catholic church was forcing these adoptions, why should the STATE accept financial responsibility for any reparations? I'm not familiar with the history here - did the government threaten the RC church somehow if it didn't force these women to surrender their children? Did the government dictate this policy to all healthcare providers, or just the RC group? How is this now the government's responsibility?

I am guessing the same logic that the RCC is using to say that priests aren't employees of the RCC to make them immune from lawsuits from the people they molested?

[Guest Anonymous]

The Magdalens were active in the US, and then there were the illegal native American adoptions, Roloff homes, Rebekh homes (sp) and Fornits homes. Google Baby Scoop Era.

[Deleted03]

Happened in Québec and then the kids were put in horrible orphanage where they were molested, abused, and blamed for the sins of their mothers. There has been a long process of trial, and official excuses I think. The few documentaries I watched are truly horrific.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duplessis_Orphans

[Rosa]

The government apologized because they facilitated it, and it wasn't just Catholics - public social workers forced women to give up babies, too, and failed to get consent and did all sorts of other shady stuff.

The government of Canada has formally apologized, too. I don't think the government of the US ever has, even though we had our own Baby Scoop era.

[Guest Anonymous]

It did happen here in the US. I know a woman who when she had her first born in the mid 60's as an unwed teen mother, her baby was removed by force and she has never seen her baby again.

I knew girls who vanished into the Maggies, and my own parents threatened to send me off to them in 1970, because I was a free lovin' hippy in college. It was then I found out I wasn't a possession and I had rights.

[Kaylee]

The Magdalens were active in the US, and then there were the illegal native American adoptions, Roloff homes, Rebekh homes (sp) and Fornits homes. Google Baby Scoop Era.

Rebekah was one of the Roloff homes. They were still taking children from their mothers and adopting them out in the 1990s.