The Archbishop of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally, delivered a formal apology Thursday on behalf of the Church of England for its part in a decades-long practice that resulted in 185,000 children being taken from unmarried mothers and placed for adoption in the years following World War Two.
During that era, Christian churches and the British government worked together within a system that shamed and pressured young women who had children outside of marriage into surrendering their babies, all in the name of conforming to the social expectations of the time.
The Church of England’s involvement centered on facilities known as “mother and baby homes,” where unmarried women — frequently sent there against their will — lived during and after their pregnancies before being separated from their newborns. A comparable program was operated in Ireland by the Catholic Church.
“We are profoundly sorry for the pain, trauma and stigma experienced — and still carried — by many people because of historical adoption practices in homes affiliated to the Church of England,” Mullally said in a statement released by the Church.
The British government is also anticipated to issue its own apology on behalf of the state. Ireland and Australia are among the other nations that have already made similar acknowledgments in recent years.
The Adult Adoptee Movement, an organization representing individuals who were forcibly adopted, pushed back against the Church’s statement, calling it “minimising, passive and distancing language” and saying the Church did not adequately recognize the specific harms that were inflicted.
A report released by the Church alongside Thursday’s apology estimated that as many as 200 of these mother and baby homes may have operated between 1949 and 1976. The report described daily life inside those homes — where some women were forced to stay for several years — as being “characterised by domestic work, prayer and penitence.”
A separate government report issued in March described the treatment of expectant mothers, many of whom were under 18 years old, during pregnancy and childbirth as “inhumane,” and noted that those who were adopted have faced lasting consequences from being separated from their birth mothers.
Mullally also acknowledged that women and girls in these homes were sometimes required to perform menial and physical labor as a form of so-called “correction.”
“Today, we say to each of you: the shame you were made to feel was wrong. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Rather, we are deeply ashamed that this happened to people in the care of Christian communities,” she stated.
