TWO OF the religious congregations which ran Magdalene laundries in
the State set up and continue to run the Dublin-based Ruhama agency,
which is funded by the State and works “with women affected by
prostitution and other forms of commercial sexual exploitation”.
According to its website, the agency receives funding from the Department of Health and the Department of Justice.
Ruhama,
which means “renewed life” in Hebrew, is described as “a joint
initiative of the Good Shepherd Sisters and the Sisters of Our Lady of
Charity, both of which had a long history of involvement with
marginalised women, including those involved in prostitution”.
Both
congregations refused to meet Justice for Magdalenes, a support group
for women who had been in the laundries, including those run by the Good
Shepherd Sisters at Limerick, Cork, Waterford and New Ross, and those
run by the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity at High Park in Drumcondra and
Seán MacDermott Street in Dublin.
In a letter to Justice for
Magdalenes spokesman Prof James Smith on June 23rd last year, Sr Sheila
Murphy of the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity said she did “not wish to
have, nor do I see any purpose in having, a meeting with you at this
time”.
In an e-mail of June 17th last year, Sr Bernie McNally of
the Good Shepherd Sisters told Prof Smith she would not be able to
engage in a meeting with him and “will not be able to respond further”.
Top of the list of Ruhama’s board of directors are Sr Sheila Murphy and Sr Bernadette McNally.
As reported in
The Irish Times , figures disclosed to Sinn Féin’s Caoimhghín Ó
Caoláin by Minister for Health Dr James Reilly revealed that the Good
Shepherd Sisters have received more than €14.4 million from the Health
Service Executive since 2006.
No figures were disclosed for what
sums the Sisters of Our Lady of Charity received over that period, or
for what either order received from the Department of Justice.
Despite
selling off extensive properties in Waterford, Cork and Limerick, the
Good Shepherd Sisters said, following publication of the Ryan report in
2009, that they had no resources to contribute to the costs of redress
for people who had been abused as children in institutions which they
had also run.