Atheist Ireland Forum

One aspect of the consultation I found fascinating was how critical the pupils were of what they considered the wishy-washy nature of the religious education

"Some said it was their heritage, that it was good to move forward but it was also good to have Catholic schools."

Paganism, druids, sectarian violence, alcoholism, and rotten potatoes are also part of Irish heritage; Catholicism belongs in history class with the rest of them, not as an ethos to penetrate the entire curriculum and take valuable hours of education time that could better to be spent teaching maths and language skills.

The worst aspect of this article is that it is sneaky; Ms O'Brien tries to sound understanding of the other side while merely expressing a harmless personal opinion of why the it is important that Catholic schools prevail. In reality, it is a very measured attempt to sway people by cherry-picking points from a biased survey and erecting the imaginary threat of an atheist school in which children are indoctrinated into disbelief with the same shamelessness as they are indoctrinated into Catholicism in RC schools.

The survey conducted was undertaken by the Catholic Schools Partnership. It had 237 participants made up of "those involved and interested in Catholic primary education". This is a incredibly biased survey involving a very small number of participants, who responded to an invitation targeted towards "those who are interested in the future of Catholic schools" (page 48 of Report). Also consider that these (primary school) students being surveyed and responding that Catholic schools are important to their heritage are being educated by none other than Catholic schools. It seems unfair to interview children about their attachment to the only school they've ever attended.

Not only that, but if you look at the report on the survey, it is selective reporting of open answers provided by various participants. If does not offer any kind of information that can be charted or graphed to represent any "negative" responses; indeed, given the lack of attempt to invite people opposed to RC education, it is unlikely there were negative responses, but had there been any, they simply could have been omitted from the report.

But of course, Breda O'Brien doesn't expect her unsuspecting readers to question the 57-page report or it's objectives. Perhaps she does not question the report herself.

A survey like this needs to be conducted by the State, and the participants need to be parents, teachers and community members interested in Education, NOT the preservation of Catholic Schools, and all demographics need to be equally represented.

As for the Richard Dawkins school - it's put into this article either out of ignorance, or as a calculated tactic to scare parents. The demand is for secular education, which has no interest in singing about heaven or worshipping a statue of anyone. The most dangerous lessons your child will receive in a secular school are in maths, literacy, critical thinking, etc; Religious indoctrination is left for parents and their religious communities.

You see this is why we need an organisation like Atheist Ireland to represent us.

The press is always giving free and unchallenged reign to the misrepresentations of the Catholic lobby, but whenever someone like Michael Nugent writes some short articles trying to raise awareness of the positive aspects of atheism he gets either self-proclaimed "scientists" touting the anthropic principle or from alleged "humanists" wasting his time trolling bizarrely pedantic dictionary definitions of atheism at him.

It's all about consciousness-raising. Every little helps!

Thank very much for your comment. It make me to think about for my ideals. I'll share soon again.