A local city councillor is calling on the Sisters of Mercy and Christian Brothers to join forces and donate lands at Taylor’s Hill for a special memorial park for children abused in State run institutions in Galway.
Cllr Catherine Connolly says it would be “obscene” for the Sisters of Mercy to proceed with a major housing development at the Lenaboy Castle site in Taylor’s Hill in the wake of the “shocking” Ryan Commission Report into the abuse of children in institutions.
“The contents of the Ryan Commission Report are particularly shocking in the context of Galway city and Connemara where there were three very large industrial and reformatory schools, one at Letterfrack and another at St Josephs in Salthill run by the Christian Brothers and the third at Lenaboy in Taylor’s Hill run by the Sisters of Mercy. The litany of abuse sustained by innocent children in institutions over a sustained period of time is simply mind boggling,” says Cllr Connolly.
“Even more disturbing however is the nature of the denial by the various orders and in particular the Christian Brothers right up to the publication of the report. In these circumstances more than words are needed by way of apology and it is time for the orders to give back.
“In this context it would be obscene for the Sisters of Mercy to proceed with the proposed housing development at St Anne’s, Taylor’s Hill, where their application for a huge housing development is currently under appeal to an Bord Pleanala.”
She says she has called on the Sisters of Mercy in the past and is calling on the order again to give the land to the city council to be developed as a special memorial park.
“The Christian Brothers must of course come on board with the Sisters and share in the financial loss and the cost of developing the park. The giving over of these lands would go some way to making amends and would be a special way of cherishing, remembering and paying tribute to those children who were so shamefully abused.”
Cllr Connolly says this would also help in the healing process by “providing a safe green oasis and a place of reflection for all of us as a society who failed these children.”
It would also be a public acknowledgement by the orders in question that the children under their care were innocent victims who did nothing wrong, she says
