>>For example, you could look at the outcomes of unwed mothers and their adopted-out children in the context of the societies of the day, and possibly make an argument that overall religious aid societies improved those outcomes. But any attempt to use that as carte blanche to justify all of their actions will lead to outrage, in the very human sense that "one aw-shit wipes out 1,000 attaboys".

Seems to me you've always got to compare actions to alternatives. So if a particular institution did bad, what was society's alternative? If the alternative was worse, then it's difficult for society to attack the institution until it's dissected its own behavior first. Let s/he who is without sin throw the first stone etc. Seems to me that people always are eager to throw the first stone.

>>As a counter-example to yours, there have been serious allegations if not proven cases where new mothers were told their babies were stillborn, when in fact they were not. Without knowledge of the relevant legislation I'd like to think that act has been illegal in what we would call modern Western societies since at least the dawn of the 20th century, if not much earlier.

Agreed. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions, and you can be sure that those who did these things believed they were softening the blow and saving the mother a tough decision while also securing the infant a better life. But things will change, and IMHO it's well worth reviewing the history of adoption in the first world and the current source of babies for desperate adoptive parents, often now from orphanages in the old Communist states.