L' ÉCOLE RÉSISTE TOUJOURS

Most recently on 27 June, following a conference on

school patronage, the Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid

Martin, in a press release, reiterated his willingness “to

divest some primary schools of their Catholic patronage,

if that is what parents want... The Catholic Church

currently controls more than 3,000 of the 3,200 primary

schools in the State ... Today’s conference is discussing

new ways to manage primary schools in an increasingly

multicultural and secular Ireland.”

However, Bishop O’Reilly at the same conference was

insistent that religious instruction must be exactly that,

delivered by teachers qualified in their own religion and

during the school day. Catherine O’Brien, Chair of the

HAI, and Paul Rowe, CEO of Educate Together,

questioned why such teaching, which clearly segregates

children by faith of their parents during their teaching

day, couldn’t take place after school hours.

The training of teachers is another serious issue in

Ireland as most institutions are denominational (no

points for guessing which denomination has the greatest

number!) so once again people’s integrity is being

compromised in their desire to teach if they are nonreligious.

So, what the future holds is a mystery.[…]. The weave of

religion and state education in Ireland remains hard to

disentangle but a poll reported on 30th June 2008 gives

some hope;

“More than 70 per cent of parents would prefer to see schools

run by the State with equal status and opportunity for all

religions…Only 43 per cent of all those with children under

the age of 15 would like to see the 2 hours now spent on

teaching religion each week retained”.

Extrait d’un article de Ann James (Humanist Association of Ireland – HAI)

N° d’Août 2008  de « International Humanist News » (IHEU)

[Désolé, mon anglais n'est pas suffisant pour m'autoriser une traduction correcte :-) ]