Thankful for the Church support

Published: 6 December 2009

RE Bill Hanley's letter, "Orphanage gave hope to children" (CL 22/11/09).

Firstly I would ask readers to remember that in the period 1940 to 2000, which will do as starting and finishing dates for my comments, the Queensland Government as well as others, did not run or operate orphanages.

Governments in their wisdom relied on the Churches primarily to do this function of welfare.

I was, as a six-month-old baby, placed by the Government of Queensland as a state ward, into the care of the Catholic Church as well as my mother, and that was in early 1941.

My two brothers and two sisters were placed in different care than my mother and myself - either the Salvation Army, private foster care or allotted to other Church denominations.

I was not aware that I even had brothers and sisters until I was about nine years old.

My mother often told me "they took my babies away".

Mum and all us children were removed from Monto in 1941.

My mother and myself were sent by the Government Court in 1941 to stay at what was then The Holy Cross Retreat in Wooloowin, Brisbane.

Mum stayed at this centre, and her life revolved around the centre and its activities, until her death in 1999, at the age of 95 years.

This retreat is now The Allambe Home for the Aged, and is still on part of the old site of the former Retreat.

As for myself, from early 1941 until I was two years old, I stayed with my mother at The Retreat.

Then, I was transferred to what was then the Catholic Church Nudgee Orphanage, where I remained until I was 21 years old, the then legal adult age, when I left the orphanage.

I have always remembered and still do, my mothers words "they took my babies away", and as a mother myself, know the anguish she must have felt and loss at losing her children under the circumstances as they happened in her life.

The man who is still my husband, and the father of my three children, met me in Warwick, Queensland, in 1961, and we married four years later, and have had a happy, holy lifestyle during our 44 years together.

I can only offer thanks and praise for the Catholic Church, and contempt for the Queensland Government interference in my early life and for taking away from me, the joy and contentment of family unity with my siblings and mother by their side.

The orphanage trained me in the skills of life, and equipped me for a Christian upbringing and we have carried this teaching in our married life and tried to instill this lifestyle in our own children.

I well remember Sr Germana, and Sr Champion, as well as Mother Liam as being a positive influence on my life, and worked with them all in the babies, toddlers, and younger children at Nudgee Orphanage.

Today, in my retired years, I still do voluntary work with children, and have my Diploma in Early Education and also Child Care plus other necessary qualifications for this type of volunteer work.

Thank you to the Catholic Church and its personnel who raised me in my early years.

I was not sexually assaulted or abused by any Church personnel during all my 21 years as a state ward, and I am thankful to God for helping me cope through a difficult early life.

As Garth Brooks says in his song Unanswered Prayers, "... and then and now I thank the Good Lord for all the gifts in my life".

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