That Story About the Irish Nuns Who Abused Her in a Magdalene Laundry?
I hear about the terrible state of things in the Irish Catholic Church on that Protestant homeschooling forum that I hang out on as “proof” of the terrible state of the Catholic Church in general. Now I happen to think that personal bias of the person testifying to the disintegration of the Catholic Catholic Church jaundices her view of things and I am not inclined to think that the picture presented represents an accurate portrayal. Every Irish Catholic that I have met has been deeply orthodox and devout and American Catholics everywhere consider themselves blessed to have an Irish priest as a pastor, but my testimony means nothing to the discussion at hand because I’m not there and couldn’t possible see the horrible things that have been done. Now it has never been mentioned by name specifically but some of what’s been said seems to have been shaped by the book Kathy’s Story and the movie that came out of it. Guess what? It’s not true and apparently many of the other misery memoirs are not true either. I do not for a second mean to imply that every bad story to come out of the Irish Catholic Church is not true. I suspect that they’ve had their share of true scandal and heartbreak just as we have here in the United States. Our Lord told us that there would be tares in the wheat and even He had to endure the heartbreak of being betrayed by someone He had chosen. How can we expect any different?
I don’t suppose that those** who believe a memoir such as Kathy’s Story is representative of Catholics will care much that it isn’t true. But it isn’t. And that makes me smile.
**ETA (May 29, 2008) It has been brought to my attention that the person whose opinion I erroneously believed MIGHT have been shaped by the reading of Kathy’s story has not read that book and indeed has never heard of that book or the movie. Therefore, I wish specifically to exclude her from inclusion in any way shape or form by my use of the indefinite plural pronoun ‘those’ used in this sentence. I also wish to state that I was completely erroneous in my opinion that the following statement of hers ““No, some of them are child beaters; sadistic beasts who loved to beat children till some of them died or ended up in hospital, with no questions asked. Some are cowards;who loved to terrorise and humiliate little children. Some are slave drivers; forcing orphans and young girls to work in laundries, starving them, locking them up, neglecting to provide even the most basic of care.” made in response to a statement that “not all priests are child molestors” was in ANY way shaped by the book mentioned in this blog entry. It was my mistake and I am sincerely sorry.
Thank you kindly to Standing on My Head
One last thing. If you are Catholic and Irish and would like to tell me about the great things happening in your church, you can’t believe how much I would like to hear about it. Comment here or email me at redneckwomandesigns [at] yahoo [dot] com
