Pádraig McCarthy: The Church and Healthcare
On Saturday 7 May 2022, an editorial, “Irish Times view on new National Maternity Hospital” said, “concerns were raised over possible Catholic influence on the maternity hospital after it moved to a religious-owned campus. Given the history of church interference in health, these concerns were understandable.”
In the light of the recent controversy over the move of the National Maternity Hospital to the site of St Vincent’s Hospital at Elm Park, perhaps the impression is widespread that the any Catholic influence is malign, and that the Church has no business whatever being involved with healthcare.
Our gospel reading for 3 July 2022, 14th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C, shows how utterly mistaken that view would be. Luke 10:9 says of the mission Jesus gave to his 70 (or 72) disciples on entering a town: “Cure the sick who are there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’” Healthcare, care for the sick, goes back to the very roots of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. Whether in the home or in a hospital, it has been an integral part of the commission of Jesus to his disciples and a sign of the kingdom of God. Being a Christian cannot be a purely spiritual way of life, but always involves care for human beings in their full bodily and spiritual dimensions. The Corporal Works of Mercy express this. In Ireland, it goes back to medieval times. A leper hospital (among many), St Stephen’s in Dublin, from which St Stephen’s Green gets its name, is mentioned in 1230AD in the records of Dublin Corporation. The curve in Stephen Street Upper and Lower may indicate the line of the boundary.
From hearing what many have said about the National Maternity Hospital, one might conclude that the Church has attempted to force its influence on a State institution. There is no truth whatever in such an idea.
The history of the hospital by Tony Farmar published for its centenary in 1994, commissioned by the Master, Dr Peter Boylan, paints a different picture.
When a small lying-in hospital in Holles Street collapsed for lack of funds, “various Catholic interests filled the gap.” In the Introduction, Farmar wrote: “The founding members were determined to create a Catholic maternity facility for a largely Catholic population. Neither the Rotunda nor the Coombe was regarded as such … They declared that the management of the Hospital be exclusively Catholic, though the benefits were to be given without question of creed. This rule echoed faithfully, though probably unconsciously, the original Rotunda rule ‘that None but Protestants shall be permitted to attend the said Hospital as Officers, Assistants, Nurse-Keepers or Servants.’”
The Rotunda and the Coombe hospitals were founded at a time when Penal Laws were still in force against Catholics, so it is understandable that when those laws were mostly lifted, Catholics would want a maternity hospital with their own ethos. Thankfully, our hospitals have become more inclusive.
Sadly, government policy is reviving the kind of religious discrimination we hoped was long gone. Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, addressed the Dáil in a debate on the National Maternity Hospital on 12 May 2022. He said:
“It is also being demanded, quite rightly, that there be no religious influence in this new hospital. Ireland has a dark history when it comes to the church and women’s reproductive health.”
Then, nine more times, he said that there would be no religious influence/ethos in the new hospital. Presumably reflecting accurately the decision of the government, he spoke after the Cabinet decision on 17 May 2022 to proceed with the existing plan for the new National Maternity Hospital. He said, as reported that day on RTÉ News at One:
“There will not be, there cannot be, and there never will be any religious ethos or influence in the provision of services in the new hospital.”
The then Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, welcoming Pope Francis on 24 August 2018, gave voice to a different narrative when he said:
“People of profound Christian faith … founded our oldest hospitals, staffed them, and provided welfare for so many of our people… It is easy to forget that the Irish State, founded in 1922, did not set up a Department of Health or a Department of Social Welfare until 1947… Providing healthcare, education and welfare is now considered a core function of our State. When the state was founded, it was not. The Catholic Church filled that gap to the benefit of many generations of our people. We remain profoundly grateful for that contribution.”
The enormous contribution to healthcare in Ireland (and around the world) by religious organisations both in the past and in the present day, whether working independently or in partnership with statutory authorities, must not be blown away by ignorance of the truth.
We not only pray “Thy kingdom come”; we witness to it and help make it real when we as a Church work to bring health care to the world.
Pádraig McCarthy: The Church and Healthcare
Pádraig, I find it hard to believe that you are genuinely surprised at the general mistrust there is in the country towards religious orders.
And, that you could say, keeping a straight face, given our history of massive Church influence on every Irish life that;
“From hearing what many have said about the National Maternity Hospital, one might conclude that the Church has attempted to force its influence on a State institution. There is no truth whatever in such an idea.”
Also, you quote the then Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, in welcoming Pope Francis on August 24th 2018.
However, you omit the rest of what the then Taoiseach had to say:
“At times in the past we have failed. There are ‘dark aspects’ of the Catholic Church’s history, as one of our bishops recently said. We think of the words of the Psalm which tells us that ‘children are a heritage from the Lord’ and we remember the way the failures of both Church and State and wider society created a bitter and broken heritage for so many, leaving a legacy of pain and suffering.
It is a history of sorrow and shame.
In place of Christian charity, forgiveness and compassion, far too often there was judgement, severity and cruelty, in particular, towards women and children and those on the margins.
Magdalene Laundries, Mother and Baby Homes, industrial schools, illegal adoptions and clerical child abuse are stains on our State, our society and also the Catholic Church. Wounds are still open and there is much to be done to bring about justice and truth and healing for victims and survivors.
Holy Father, I ask that you use your office and influence to ensure this is done here in Ireland and across the World.
In recent weeks, we have all listened to heart-breaking stories from Pennsylvania of brutal crimes perpetrated by people within the Catholic Church, and then obscured to protect the institution at the expense of innocent victims. It is a story all too tragically familiar here in Ireland.
There can only be zero tolerance for those who abuse innocent children or who facilitate that abuse.
We must now ensure that from words flow actions.
Above all, Holy Father, I ask to you to listen to the victims.”
That sums up perfectly why there is so much mistrust of religious orders and the institutional Church in general.
The film Philomena was back on television over here on BBC 1 on Sunday night a few weeks ago. For years, I had never had occasion to see it. Then during the first lockdown I was able to watch it for the first time. Then I saw it again perhaps a year ago so my recent viewing was my third time to watch it.
Every time I see it I am filled with a sense of deep, deep sadness and also deep, deep anger — outrage, in fact. How could such absolute evil exist under the guise of Catholic Christianity?
And, of course, there were hundreds of Sr. Hildegards all over our country.
You quoted St. Luke’s gospel. All the gospels are full of wonderful moral guidance that had no influence at all, it would seem, on those who were responsible for the “judgement, severity and cruelty, in particular, towards women and children and those on the margins.”
PS. As I looked down the list of articles on the ACP Home Page I was saddened to find not one comment beneath any of the articles listed. Our once vibrant site is now dead. I think that is a great loss.
Pádraig McCarthy: The Church and Healthcare
Paddy –
I agree with you that the lack of activity on the ACP website is sad. The new layout does not invite participation like the previous layout. I don’t know the reason for the new look. Maybe it has something to do with making it more suitable for small handheld devices?
You say: “I find it hard to believe that you are genuinely surprised at the general mistrust there is in the country towards religious orders.” I don’t know where you got that idea – I expressed no such surprise.
My comment was about the National Maternity Hospital, and so, yes, it was with a genuine straight face that I wrote that in this it is untrue that the church has attempted to force its influence on a State institution. The National Maternity Hospital (until now at least) was never a State institution, but a Catholic institution.
That is why I selected those parts of Leo Varadkar’s comments which are relevant to the National Maternity Hospital. I could have quoted all the parts you give, but that would have distracted from the core fact which I wanted to communicate.
I made no suggestion that the Catholic church is without fault in all its actions in this State; nor that the State is without fault.
Article 44, Section 2, subsection 3 of the Irish Constitution states: “The State shall not impose any disabilities or make any discrimination on the ground of religious profession, belief or status.” It seems to me that we must ask whether the Minister for Health and the government are in contravention of the Constitution in their decision that “There will not be, there cannot be, and there never will be any religious ethos or influence in the provision of services in the new hospital.”
Pádraig McCarthy: The Church and Healthcare
Pádraig, it’s good to hear from you. I have been missing our deep and profound — sometimes controversial — debates with my ACP digital friends, especially Joe. Joe and I were just getting started on a great discussion on apostolic succession and the origins of priesthood when the old order changed giving way to the new. However, I have it on good authority that things will be soon be back to normal.
Even though I could never agree with your long-held position in trying to defend or somehow deflect blame in relation to the crimes of our institutional Church, I always do admire how you can always mount such a staunch and, seemingly, well reasoned case for the defence even in the most difficult of circumstances and in the most unwinnable of debates and discussions.
Uppermost in my mind is always the question, can our Church ever recover some semblance of respect and credibility in the wider world again? Defending the indefensible will certainly not achieve that.
Tony and Brendan’s reports from Athlone have given me great hope. I was bordering on the emotional reading Brendan’s article. I too never thought I would witness such an event. Then, of course, I never dreamt that I would ever see a decent, sensible and enlightened man like Francis in Rome. It is absolutely wonderful that the Synod has been so embraced at home. Not so over here, sadly.
If we only had old Ireland over here.
As it happens, a report from the Scottish Commission on Child Abuse was released this week.
The heading in The Scotsman was:
God was “weaponised” by priests to help silence their victims and justify their abuse.
I will share the whole article below.
Some findings we could all agree with such as:
“But as an institution, there was this message: avoid bringing scandal on the church. Which essentially has translated across institutions into protect the institution and its reputation before you protect the child or the young person.”
However, there are other findings that I am not so sure of, such as that imposed celibacy is not a causative factor.
It is a good few years now since I read Marie Keenan’s wonderful book/study “Child Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church. Gender, Power and Organisational Culture”. However, I am pretty certain that Marie concluded that celibacy was indeed a very important factor. I think she found three categories of priestly adherence to celibacy and those priests who tried hardest to remain faithful to their vow were the ones most likely to abuse children.
This, below, is the article from Thursday’s The Scotsman.
God was “weaponised” by priests to help silence their victims and justify their abuse, an inquiry report has found.
A report into the psychology of people who abuse children was released by the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry on Wednesday, with its roundtable experts finding abusers from religious settings “had the capacity for self-delusion, engaging in thinking that was illogical” and that some “handed the moral responsibility for the abuse back to God”.
The 33-page report said it may have been easier for those from religious settings to abuse because of them being able to take advantage of the habitual deference offered to them.
Lady Smith, chair of the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry.
Abusers could rely on being in high regard, using that as a way to silence children, and may have even allowed the abuser to think he had the permission to abuse children and “act with impunity”.
The expert panel told inquiry chairwoman Lady Smith that God was “weaponised” and the Catholic Church “reinforced that sense of permission to abuse children”.
Martin Henry, formerly a lay adviser on safeguarding to the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh for 22 years, said “there is a historical legacy that people should avoid at all costs bringing scandal on the church”.
He added: “When you add God in as the other factor, who is always there, omnipresent, watching what you are doing and listening to what you’re saying and knowing what you’re thinking, it becomes all the more powerful.
“As a mechanism to silence children, it had proven very effective.”
In the roundtable, he told the inquiry he was “astonished” so many had found the courage to “really break through that and talk about it”.
He added: “But as an institution, there was this message: avoid bringing scandal on the church. Which essentially has translated across institutions into protect the institution and its reputation before you protect the child or the young person.”
They said there was no link between celibacy and the abuse of children. Sexual abuse of children is not the result of sexual frustration, the report said, and is not likely to shift a person away from their primary sexual orientation.
Lady Smith published the findings in “The Psychology of Individuals Who Abuse Children” on Wednesday.
Experts, including forensic clinical psychologists and others experienced in child protection, discussed the characteristics, motivation, and techniques of those who abuse children in care.
Among the key findings to emerge from the roundtable were that there is no single abuser type, nor was there similar characteristic among abusers.
It found there was no definitive answer to why abuse happens, but some who sexually abuse children are completely driven to do so and will design their lives accordingly.
However, others act in response to opportunities presented to them rather than created by them, the abuse inquiry report found.
The report also concluded that recruitment processes are not sophisticated enough to identify those who are going to be a risk to children if appointed to the role for which they are applying.
The experts all agreed that disclosure, for example under the PVG scheme, was of limited value yet it utilises much energy and focus that could be better directed.
Lady Smith said: “The findings record what I identify to have been the most significant points that emerged from the roundtable discussions, particularly those that may have relevance for future recommendations for the protection of children in care from abuse.”
A spokesman for the Catholic Church said: “While many institutions, including the church, may previously have sought to protect their reputations, a significant cultural change in recent decades has seen safeguarding practice become permanently embedded.
“The Catholic Church maintains a deep and unwavering commitment to the highest standards of safeguarding in order to ensure that the church is a place of safety for all.”