Catholic Church.

The recent report says that there is no evidence that woman were forced to sign their babies away but lots of women gave evidence to say it had happened to them. Apparently they are simply to be disbelieved.

AFAIK ‘churching’ was not confined to the Catholic Church. In a Mediterranean (Orthodox) culture where we once lived, a woman was considered ‘unclean’ when menstruating, ditto after childbirth when there was still a discharge. So she was not supposed to enter the church until she was ‘clean’ again, about 6 weeks later. Whereupon she’d go to be ‘churched’.

Whether the same was once true of the C of E I don’t know, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
My family was not religious but in mid teens I was confirmed in the C of E - it was a social thing more than anything else - Sundays were so unbelievably boring then and at least you saw your friends at the pre Evensong class on Sunday!

Anyway, IIRC we were given a little book of ‘prayers for women and girls’ - I dare say I’ve still got it somewhere - where I’m pretty sure there was something about ‘the churching of women’.

Newatthis The advice to go out and multiply is an Old Testament command, not a New Testament comand and Christianity is based on the New Testament. it looks back to the Old Testament, it respects it and sees it as prophesying what was to come, but it is not the basis for Christianity.

The decision that priests could not marry was made in the mid 12th century at a time when being a priest was a far more rigourous task than it is now. A priest is expected to devote his whole life to his service as a priest and it was considered that could not happen if he also had family responsibilities.

In the past priests would be serving huge areas and constantly travelling and while priests do not take vows of poverty, as monks do, they are expected to live very simply, especially when they are working with parishioners who are themselves living in poverty. Catholic priests do not receive a minimum salary as many do in other religions and must depend on his parishioners for his stipend, which in poorer parishes may be very small. It is one thing to dedicate oneself to a life of poverty, when you could have a career that was better paid but to expect your wife and child to do so also, is, perhaps a sacrifice too far.

There is nothing in principle to stop the church changing its policy on this - and I suspect this will become needful as vocations fall. Already married men with careers and families are entering the preliminary levels of being priests by becoming deacons, but their service is essentially part time and one day we may have to accept the end of celibacy and having a part time priesthood.

I can understand those who have no faith disagreeing with
giving thanks to God ,churching, but I wonder how many married in church

Mamardoit

Anniebach

I was churched after the birth of my two daughters ,1969 and 1970, Church of Wales.

No superstition, no thought of being unclean, but to give thanks

Yes I know that this did happen at our village C of E in the 1960s. Maybe a bit later. It was to give thanks that mother and baby were well.

I was churched after the birth of my 2 children, ( CofE ), in 1972 & 1980, for those very same reasons.
Thank you Anniebach & Mamardoit.

It`s called being brainwashed imo.
Mostly made up by priests/pastors/fathers and daft old wives tales.

My parents were Catholics from Southern Ireland. We went to Catholic schools here in England. The nuns (with one or two exceptions), priests and Marist brothers who taught us were frightening.
My mother had seven children and a drunken, violent husband. Nuns regularly used to visit the house trying to get her to give funds to the church when she could hardly feed her children.

Newatthis I asked your question of an Anglican priest, a
Catholic priest and several Nuns, all gave the same answer -
they can give all to the service to God and to man,

That someone is held responsible and pays a price for it. I dont necessarily mean a monetary price.

Galaxy would you explain what you mean by justice ?

Did it happen - yes. Has anyone denied it happened - no.

Is anyone who suffered not free to publicly tell their story - yes .

Just going off slightly but still under the heading of 'Catholic Church' why aren't priests allowed to marry and have families when in the Bible it says 'Go forth and multiply' - does this mean have a family (which includes a wife/partner)? Have I got it wrong or misunnderstood. Why are they forbidden to get married - does anyone know?

Justice and to have the story told in public.

Galaxy it hasn’t been denied , it is believed , what else is there apart from money ?

I was not churched in the accepted sense of the word, but did have a church blessing to give thanks for a safe delivery and a healthy child.

I dont think compensation cases such as this are ever about money, they are about seeking justice and I guess most importantly about being believed.

So it’s about money again .

If the State blames everyone then there is no one group to blame. This means that no one can be sued or held accountable. This is yet another way of the State protecting the Church. Some people have been through the courts and been granted compensation. None of the compensation has ever been paid. The children's bodies are still in the pits they were thrown into. OK so they've put a garden of remembrance over the top now but those little ones were all but tossed away like so much rubbish. No organisation should get away with that.

paddyanne there will always be exceptions to any rule. But when you are talking about a society as a whole generalisations have to be made. The pressures of society led to conformism.

The usual way to deal with an awkward problem was to send the 'miscreant' to England, out of sight, out of mind.

On a different aspect of the same problem, many young people were dedicated to the church to become religious, at birth, having a religious in the famy brought status and solved a lot of inheritance problems. If the young person morally blackmailed into becoming religious,either refused to enter the religious life or started but walked out, they too got sent to England. I met several such girls in London in the 1960s.

I dont believe that Monica,the Irish are no different to any others some of my Irish relatives are protestant they had the same attitude to unwed mothers and that wasn't church led .Look at NI now when the anti same sex relationships and anti abortion lobby is from the Protestant community

.On the other side my mothers family were staunch Irish Catholics...mass every day no meat on Fridays etc.They kept their illegitimate GD and raised her with their youngest daughters but she knew my Aunt was her mother .That wee girl is in her 80's now so it was a long time .I always find these generalisations about Ireland annoying .Its my second home

Vampirequeen, there never was any division between being Irish and being catholic. The cruelty to those who trangressed the rules ingrained in the people first and then the church and state because of this indivisibility between church and nationality cannot be allocatted between church, state and people. They arose form the culture and the culture was indivisible from the religion.

Sounds a bit like the Apostles Creed

vampirequeen everyone is to blame is not removing blame
from the church and state .

If as you say ‘the parents turned a blind eye they had been conditioned to do so through their Church based education’
are you claiming all parents in the U.K. whose daughters went
to homes for unmarried mothers had a Church education?

I think we have to remember that 'unclean' did not necessarily mean dirty in ancient times. It could mean ill or, as in the case of a new mother and child, not yet able to undertake the full range of activities previously expected. Churching was usually done about 6 weeks after the birth which coincides with the length of time for the womb to heal and sexual activity to resume. Nowadays, with modern medicine, this is less of a problem. It gave the mother time to bond with the child and establish breastfeeding. Sexual relations were resumed after churching when there was less risk of infection. Churching is available in a range of denominations.
The Church may not have sent these women to the homes but they certainly treated them harshly once there and they must bear the blame for that.

The Irish State saying that everyone is responsible removes the blame from the Church and State. Yes people sent their daughters to these places and turned a blind eye to what went on their but they had been conditioned to do so through their Church based education. The State and Church colluded to control the Irish people through the use of religion. No one questioned the Church therefore no one questioned the State.

Even now the State is protecting the Church from compensation claims.

the mikvah is used by orthodox jewish women after each menstrual period.
so that she will be cleansed, and can resume contact with her husband.
even everyday contact is not allowed til then, eg he cannot hand her a book, he will put it on a table.

My Gran talked about Churching when Mum had my sister. It’s in lots of religions. When I read The Ritual Bath by Faye Kellerman it talked about the mikvah, ritual cleansing of Orthodox Jewish Women after birth.