Bodies of 800 babies, long-dead, found in septic tank at former Irish home for unwed mothers

To paraphrase Pascal, people never do evil so completely and so cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction...

"The grim findings, which are being investigated by police, provide a glimpse into a particularly dark time for unmarried pregnant women in Ireland, where societal and religious mores stigmatized them. Without means to support themselves, women by the hundreds wound up at the Home. 'When daughters became pregnant, they were ostracized completely,' Corless said. 'Families would be afraid of neighbors finding out, because to get pregnant out of marriage was the worst thing on Earth. It was the worst crime a woman could commit, even though a lot of the time it had been because of a rape.'”

Story:   http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/06/03/bodies-of-800-babies-long-dead-found-in-septic-tank-at-former-irish-home-for-unwed-mothers/