SISTER XAVIERA, GOLDENBRIDGE AND FOREIGN ADOPTIONS

You will note that the following article from the Irish Law Archives in 1996, has a somewhat curious title - "The Past Comes Back to Haunt". You would expect to find another horror story about vile priests and nuns and the exposure of their atrocities by courageous journalists. ON THE CONTRARY. The article refers to allegations that fake birth certificates were supplied for children who were being adopted. HOWEVER the article states that 1,500 adoption files had just been discovered in the National Archives that contained full and correct documentation including signed disclaimers by the natural mothers. MOREOVER twenty people brought up by Sister Xaviera in Goldenbridge made a statement, through a solicitor, that the allegations against her were false.

So why did The Irish Law Archives publish all this under the heading "The Past Comes Back to Haunt"? I have a suggestion. People caught up in a witch-hunt will prefer the stories about witches to the evidence of their own eyes. The more honest and sober ones will TRY to record their own experiences correctly but they will "spin" the record in order to make it fit in with the prevailing hysteria. I suggest that explains why The Irish Law Archives uses a heading that contradicts the story it is supposed to be describing!.

Rory Connor
15 March 2007

THE PAST COMES BACK TO HAUNT - Irish Law Archives, 20 March 1996

With all the talk of the running of orphanages in the 1950s a spokeswoman for Dr Barnardo's called for the Government to help adopted people from that period trace their parents. It was alleged that children of unmarried mothers were often sent to the United States for
adoption and that false birth certificates showing fictitious married parents were provided. In response the Government agreed to establish a contact register to assist adopted people in tracing their natural parents, but then the Minister of State responsible, Austin Currie,
said that it may not be possible to include foreign adoptions in the register. He did not explain the perceived difficulty.

Over the next few days much was said about this "latest scandal" from our past but then the story took a strange turn. On Thursday evening Tanaiste Dick Spring was in Waterford addressing St Angela's Secondary School's annual Peace and Justice week. He used the occasion to reveal that up to 1,500 files relating to foreign adoptions had been found in the National Archives. Each file carried the identity of an Irish child being adopted overseas between 1948 and 1961, a signed disclaimer by the natural mother and documents signed by the adoptive parents from the United States. A further 300 files from a later period are in the Department of Foreign Affairs. Mr Spring has promised to make the material available to those seeking parents and children seeking reunion, after he has taken legal advice.

We also had further developments on the story which brought all this to the surface. Sister Xaviera, the Mercy nun accused of inflicting physical and mental abuse on children in the orphanages at Goldenbridge and St Kyran's, received some support last weekend. The Irish Times reported on the case of one woman who was full of praise for Sister Xaviera, who continued to care for her long after she left the orphanage, making her wedding dress, visiting her in hospital and baby-sitting. This was followed by a solicitor's letter written on behalf of about twenty other people brought up by Sister Xaviera and who wished to clear her name. Part of the letter was read out on the Morning Ireland radio programme and one of the women interviewed. She had fond memories of the nun who, although she did use corporal punishment from time to time, cared for the residents throughout their childhood and long after. Tuesday's Irish Times carried more favourable comment from men and women who saw their upbringing in St Kyran's as a positive experience and were appreciative of the care and support which Sister Xaviera provided and continued to offer when they made their way in the world.

Later in the week The Mercy Order criticised the media for its uncritical acceptance of all the adverse allegations made against the order. The order supplied journalists with a list of names of people who were brought up in the Goldenbridge Orphanage and who had a
different tale to tell. Contact with people on the list did indeed produce a radically different story from that told in the documentary on RTE almost three weeks ago. The spokes-woman for the order, Sister Helena O'Donoghue, later said that the issuing of the names of people with positive stories did not "take away from the apology issued to those who had suffered hurt".