I
grew up in the long shadow of one of Ireland’s most notorious
institutions for boys, St. Conleth’s industrial school in County Offaly.
The school’s reputation for harsh treatment was such that we were often
threatened with being sent to St. Conleth’s if we didn’t behave.
The Irish writer John McGahern, himself a victim of the tyrannical Irish version of the Catholic Church, once said: “The true history of the thirties, forties and fifties in this country
has yet to be written. When it does, I believe it will be shown to have
been a very dark time indeed, in which an insular church colluded with
an insecure state to bring about a society that was often bigoted,
intolerant, cowardly, philistine and spiritually crippled.
