Thread by @churchanity_

The husband of a survivor of Ireland’s mother and baby homes says the Church was like the secret service in the devious way they carried out adoptions.+
Church operating international human trafficking network?
@hrw @IrishMirror @rangdebasantitv
#ChildTrafficking #Ireland

The Missing Children tells the story of the Tuam mother and baby home, which made global headlines in 2014 when Catherine Corless uncovered the names of the 796 children who died there.+

The scandal revealed that the children had died in appalling circumstances and were buried in an old sewage tank on the grounds of the home, where they remain today.+

Survivors who were adopted in America reveal in the film how the nuns expected their new families to make substantial donations for years after.

Andrew Bellise, whose wife Kathy was adopted from Tuam in 1959 aged three, said: “It was a network that would give a good run to MI5 or the secret service. It was well funded, well planned, just a machine.+

“My adopted mother was very precise about how she spent her money, where it went to, for her to say something like that, it had to be true.”+

The couple revealed dozens of letters they found in Kathy’s mother’s attic after she died, with several references by the nuns saying “thank you very much for the generous donation” long after the child was adopted.+

Michael Byrne, who was also adopted from the Tuam home in the 60s, said his adoptive parents in Boston were also paying “fees” to the nuns from Temple Hill in Blackrock.

He said: “The Irish government, the orphanages, the airlines, the immigration people were all in sync with these adoptions.”+
@MichealMartinTD

In one year 500 babies left Ireland for adoption to America, and in one week alone 18 parties of children had left Shannon for America, but there are no official figures.+

A letter and photograph of the child could cost the new parents $50 before the child was placed in their care – about €3,000 in today’s money.+

Journalist and author Alison O’Reilly, who first exposed the story of the Tuam Babies burial scandal in 2014, said she believes the children in the homes made “huge money” for a lot of people, not just the Church.+

Alison, who is also one of the producers on The Missing Children and wrote the book My Name is Bridget, the story of the Tuam Home, said gardai should have been involved a long time ago.+

She told : “Babies made money for the Catholic Church, unmarried mothers were told they were not suitable to parent their own babies, instead, the nuns found a couple who were better than you because outside of marriage was viewed as worse than murder – the insanity of it all.+

“Wealthy Catholic families, or families willing to pay money, were viewed by the Church as superior to you, as the single mother, and you had no choice in the say of your own child’s future.+
@Pontifex

“The archbishop, who didn’t know the child or the mother, was signing off on these children going to America.
#America #USA