Atheist Ireland Forum

Hello,

I was rattling off a letter to the Indo today in responce to a letters correspondent that was surprised by the state organising a mass to start off the new legal term. My letter adds to the "state/church deference theme" by pointing out the monies spent by the Defence Forces employing priests.

Anyway I had a quick look athttp://www.militarychaplaincy.ie/ just to get a current chaplain headcount when I noted a pic on the front page of the website.

It shows a military chaplain with an array of medals stuck to his chest, not sure which medal is which. But one medal that caught my eye was a defence forces parachuting medal....WHY THE FUCK IS THE IRISH STATE PAYING CATHOLIC PRIESTS TO JUMP OUT OF FUCKING MILITARY AIRPLANES.



These fuckers are on up to €73,000 per year each and there are 17 of them.

presumably so they can be dropped into war zones (should the need arise) to give last rights to dying catholic soldiers .

Can't help thinking those collar badges look a bit like SS badges

Don't know about you, but I'd gladly pay priests to jump out of airplanes.

Just minus the parachutes.

Just wanted to see if they have chaplains for the CoI or even Humanist, doesn't look like they do.

Is it me but this look slightly errr Klan-ish;


same page
phew at least no burning cross:



They're heading to Lourdes, is there something the Gov isn't telling us? I know Enda's speach but.....

They have one CoI guy on i think €12k or €19k....he's part time.

The Lourdes trip is a piss up.

Annual leave is supposed to be taken but apparently not marked up in practice...so a week off courtesy of taxpayer.

he he.... i meant if we are out in Liberia or the Congo again

Your letter was published.
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/lette ... 85672.html

If you want to expand that letter into a blog post I will stick it on the front page of the site. Well written and interesting stuff.

Would it be a good idea to get in touch with their press office, for a responce/quote, maybe they plan on putting something in place for non-religious?

I have no problem with any religious-groups needs being attended too, but it must be fair to all. And I can't understand why the state is paying for it.

Well done Gavin, great letter.

As far as I can make out there are about 250 Chaplains funded by the state in second level Community Schools and designated Community Colleges. These people are paid the equivalent of a teacher's salary.

The Government are cutting special needs assistants for children with disabilities while at the same time funding Chaplains in second level schools. This is in addition to the Religion teachers. All these Chaplains do is uphold the religious ethos of these schools. I will definitely try to put a some figure on what this is costing the state.

Hmmm we should get this fact more widely known -perhaps a letter to some one connected with the special needs dispute

See my post above It would make a nice follow up post a couple of days after Gavins.

One of my posts went AWOL.

Anyway firstly a few corrections to my letter in the Indo. The pay rates I quoted were 2008 rates and these have now dropped so a baby chaplain starts now on €57,925 and can rise to €65,667 after 15 years while the head chaplain (the one with the dirty knees) is now on €68,190. Full details are here http://www.defence.ie/WebSite.nsf/eb9a86f46ada6f4280256c61003e1c58/eced65584861ba7680256c7e00421c7e/$FILE/Officers%20w.e.f.%2001Jan2010.pdf

It is interesting to note the substitute priest pay. Should resident priest not be around for a service then the "sub" gets paid €146.41 for saying a mass or blessing things and also between €22.71 and €105.63 for the numbers attending, he also gets an additional €28.63 for extra religious services. So for an airplane blessing ceremony where all Air Corps members were forced to attend the priest got €280.67 for about an hours work.

As apprentices were were forced to attend mass every week and depending on the NCO/Officer in charge sometimes after marching to the church you could leave and go for breakfast but some of the hardliners would make non believers stand outside the church until mass was over...I rememeber doing this once in the rain....I think forced by the Camp Sergeant Major. One thing I remember a lot is a strange priest coming to say mass because the resident one was visiting his mammy at weekends....see fees for substitute priest above...

Marks,

If the Dept of Education employs 250 chaplains it is a fecking national scandal. It must be costing more than €10 million....will rattle off a letter to Ruari Quinns office....