Between 1938 and 1956, an estimated 1,147 children were sent from the United Kingdom to Australia through child migration initiatives delivered by Catholic organisations. Whilst experiences of child migrants varied, there has been a growing public recognition over the past thirty years of the trauma experienced by many. Although the suffering of child migrants occurred in the context of wider policy failures, this article argues that there was a particular pattern of systemic failures characteristic of these Catholic schemes. After providing an overview of the complex organisational structure through which Catholic child migration operated, the article identifies six systemic failures in this work relating both to organisational processes and the institutional conditions to which child migrants were sent. It goes on to argue that these occurred in a framework of religious legitimation which emphasised the unique role of the Church as a mediator of salvation, the need to safeguard children's faith, the child as a member of a corporate body more than as an individual and the relative moral authority of the Church over secular institutions. Within this framework, these systemic failures were either unrecognised or seen as tolerable in the context of wider organisational and theological priorities.

中文翻译：

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从英国到澳大利亚的天主教儿童移民计划：系统性失败和宗教合法化

1938 年至 1956 年间，估计有 1,147 名儿童通过天主教组织提供的儿童移民计划从英国送往澳大利亚。虽然儿童移民的经历各不相同，但在过去三十年中，许多人所经历的创伤越来越得到公众的认可。尽管儿童移民的苦难是在更广泛的政策失败的背景下发生的，但本文认为，这些天主教计划存在一种特殊的系统性失败模式。在概述了天主教儿童移民运作的复杂组织结构之后，本文确定了这项工作中与组织过程和儿童移民被送往的制度条件相关的六个系统性失败。它继续争辩说，这些发生在宗教合法化的框架中，该框架强调教会作为救恩调解人的独特作用，需要保护儿童的信仰，儿童作为团体的成员而不是作为个人和教会对世俗机构的相对道德权威。在这个框架内，这些系统性失败要么未被承认，要么在更广泛的组织和神学优先事项的背景下被视为可以容忍的。