And it begins..................

gaynorvader

Kiwi in IE wrote: »

Sorry. I might have made that sound worse than it is inadvertently. The closest ET is a half hour drive away. So I'd have to drive for two hours a day total (there and back twice). Not quite as bad as the above but still not really compatible with working.

Ah, still a problem if you're working though, the options haven't changed too much.

Do the school provide a bus service to your area?

Kiwi in IE

I Heart Internet wrote: »

Most primary schools in England, especially in rural areas are under the management of the Church of England. One usually hears reports of people, from all religions and none, wanting to get their kids into them because the standard of education is so high. Just saying.

1/3 of schools in UK are 'faith' schools which is significantly better than 9.5/10!

Kiwi in IE

gaynorvader wrote: »

Ah, still a problem if you're working though, the options haven't changed too much.

Do the school provide a bus service to your area?

I am not sure. I wouldn't send him on a bus at 5. Maybe in a couple of years. The school is 30ish km away.

I Heart Internet

Kiwi in IE wrote: »

1/3 of schools in UK are 'faith' schools which is significantly better than 9.5/10!

You're right. I was wrong to say most. 7,000 out of 20,000 wikipedia says.

But I expect that in rural areas (as in your case) the local school might be a CoE school.

eyescreamcone

There is zero religion allowed in US schools (those funded with public money).
No symbols, prayers etc
Big trouble for any teacher who disobeys

Thus all religions/none are catered for equally - the children are just taught real school subjects.
If parents want their children to get information regarding a specific religion, they send them to sunday school etc.

There is never a serious outcry over there to change from their system to one like ours.

Kiwi in IE

I Heart Internet wrote: »

You're right. I was wrong to say most. 7,000 out of 20,000 wikipedia says.

But I expect that in rural areas (as in your case) the local school might be a CoE school.

There are numerous primary schools within a 10km radius of where we live. One of them is COI and all the rest are Catholic. It's not like we only have one school anywhere near us and it happens to be Catholic.

SpaceTime

And despite what some people say, the US education system produces a lot of very bright, communicative, bubbly people and a huge number of entrepreneurs.

I've experienced both systems first hand and the focus in the states was about thinking outside the box and presenting your ideas.

The schools also seemed to be very well resourced for IT, science, sports, loads of extra curricular activities etc etc.

I always found Irish people very self-congratulatory about the education system. It hits reasonable scores on basic skills but I think it misses out on encouraging analytical skills or logical thinking.

Things like presentation of ideas is a huge part of the US system. You are presenting to the class, doing 'show and tell' activities, book reports, debates etc from a very early age and it does wonders for confidence and ability to communicate ideas.

I just think sometimes people here just go 'dumb Americans! Our system is vastly superior' which doesn't translate in terms of things like ability to get out and run a business.

The French education system is also 100% strictly secular and it works pretty effectively too. France generally does pretty well.

I find the Irish and to an extent the British approach is head down, learn by rote, do not question or step out of line. It's all about exams and how to maximise results on them.

Even the atmosphere and the uniforms and the lack of the opposite gender is a really strange environment.

Thankfully Irish universities cheap to access and are generally liberal and open minded. I think first and second year are about undoing 'LeavingCertitis' and learning to think!

There's too much dogma both religious and non religious in the primary and secondary system here.

Kiwi in IE

There are 'faith' schools back in NZ that get partial funding which I think is fair enough. All fully funded state schools are secular and every area has a secular state school assigned to it, whether there is also a partial funded religious school or not. There are also fully private fee paying schools which can be any 'ethos' they like. I suspect (but am not certain) the the UK system is very similar if not the same.

Cabaal

Scotty # wrote: »

I'm an atheist but to be honest I think you have a neck choosing to send your kids to a catholic school and then demanding that their education is tailored to suit your non-catholic beliefs.

If this school were your only option it would be different but you said yourself you have other options, they're just too much of an inconvenience to you. There is a very very obvious solution to your problem!

You clearly don't understand the reality of the situation,

The school is state funded yet it has a catholic ethos, this is exactly the same as 80%+ of Irish schools.

Not everyone has the choice of a non-religious school locally and ultimately because the school receives funding from the tax payer it is covered by the Irish constitution which ensures that a religion can't be pushed onto a child.

The OP isn't asking for anything more then they should be legally required by by law to receive, the reality is the laws are ignored and a religious ethos is still pushed on non-religious people regardless.

If the school wants to be privately funded and receive no tax payer money then by all means I'd agree with you that the op is asking for too much, but because it is state funded the op is fully entitled to make the request they have and rightly so.

If you disagree with what the OP is requesting then clearly you disagree with the Irish constitution,

Michael Nugent

Robin has asked me to share some thoughts from Atheist Ireland’s experience.

Alive-O is not part of the state curriculum, although the state allows the school time to conduct religious education based on their own ethos. This course is Roman Catholic religious instruction, not state education, and its purpose is to form children in the Catholic faith. If you don’t want your child to be subject to Catholic faith formation, you should exercise your right to opt him or her out of that class.

We regularly deal with complaints like this, and help parents to deal with schools. If you contact Jane Donnelly at education (at) atheist (dot) ie, we can give you advice specific to your situation and ensure that you know your rights when talking with the school. In almost all cases where we helped parents to raise these issues with schools, the schools have had to back down when the legal situation has been explained to them.

However, opting your child out only puts a band-aid over the problem.

In practice, the school can make parents responsible for the supervision of their children if they wish to remove their children from religious instruction classes, prayers, and preparation for Holy Communion/Conformation or ceremonies (Mass etc). In the majority of cases children are left sitting in the back of the religious instruction class and will also attend religious ceremonies during school hours as parents simply cannot remove their child from school on a daily basis.

So in the long term we need to work towards a secular state education system.

Taking a court case poses practical difficulties, because the Irish constitution (as interpreted by the Supreme Court) protects the churches, so a court case would probably have to go to the European Court of Human Rights. The timescale involved would mean that the child would probably have finished school by the time the case was resolved.

However, we are constantly highlighting this issue politically at international level, in the context of Ireland’s obligations under freedom of conscience in international human rights treaties that we have signed up to. Education is now part of that agenda in a way that it wasn’t before we started raising the issue.

This issue is probably the most important one in bringing about an ethical secular state, because it is through the education system that the churches can effectively indoctrinate children before they reach the age of reason, thus perpetuating the cycle for another generation.

SpaceTime

Cabaal wrote: »

The school is state funded yet it has a catholic ethos, this is exactly the same as 80%+ of Irish schools.

It's actually more extreme than that.

92% are run by Catholic institutions while 96% are religious ethos if you include the small number of Church of Ireland, Presbyterian and I think one Jewish school.

Only 4% are non-denominational / multi-denominational. They still have a religious content to the curriculum it's just fully inclusive and open minded and not focused on a single religious outlook.

So, even in Educate Together you'd learn about religions and spend time personal development type subjects where as in a US public school or a French school that would just be omitted entirely and left up to the parents.

So, basically Ireland has no concept of a non-religious school at all, even if the Educate Together approach is basically secular, the Department's syllabus requires religious instruction so that time cannot be given over to say science and language, it still has to be a certain % of the teaching day.

That's not to say that the Educate Together schools are pushing any view point at all. They just seem to do a general course that's more about being aware of what religious beliefs are there.

I think that's probably a good idea as it at least promotes a bit of cross-cultural understanding.

...

I also had the experience in Dublin in the 1990s of a protestant friend of mine being asked by a kid if she worshipped the devil and a Protestant family member in the 80s/90s being told that she wasn't allowed to play with someone's children because she was a protestant!

She quite literally got a "My mammy says I shouldn't talk to you!" line from a kid when she was about 8 or 9 and it's stuck with her for ever and she feels very much like she's a minority ever sense. 25 years later she'll still bring it up!

That and various comments about her being a "Brit" etc over the years.

I even heard a line at work once where someone said : And there he was, warming his arse on the fire like big fat protestant!

So, I really think Ireland's issues with religion are deeply divisive and have been in the very recent past. I think in Northern Ireland it's actually crazy that they still continue to fund religious schools. The two communities need integration and the whole question of religious identity taken out of the equation when it comes to schooling. To me, it seems like counterproductive state-funded sectarianism.

Don't get me wrong, I think there are lots of positives about Ireland, but there are some really serious hang-ups about religion that, while they're fading, they're still there if you scratch the surface a bit.

I don't think we should be actively encouraging that kind of sectarian nonsense thorough the school system.

It's also going to get much worse if we have a situation where all the non-catholics are all in the Educate Together school and all the Catholics are in the local "National School" (Whatever that's supposed to mean as a title!)

As the country becomes (and is) more multicultural, that's just going to lead to ghettoisation. Considering that we were quite capable of making snide comments and nasty remarks to Irish protestants who are almost indisguishable from Irish catholics, you can only imagine what kind of stuff you might get when people are of different skin colour too.

To me, the whole thing just seems mind-bogglingly stupid and is creating social divisions that do not need to be there.

old hippy

SpaceTime wrote: »

I also had the experience in Dublin in the 1990s of a protestant friend of mine being asked by a kid if she worshipped the devil and a Protestant family member in the 80s/90s being told that she wasn't allowed to play with someone's children because she was a protestant!

She quite literally got a "My mammy says I shouldn't talk to you!" line from a kid when she was about 8 or 9 and it's stuck with her for ever and she feels very much like she's a minority ever sense. 25 years later she'll still bring it up!

That and various comments about her being a "Brit" etc over the years.

In the 70s, one of my C of I classmates was beaten by the teacher when he couldn't say a Confirmation prayer. He wasn't even making his Confirmation.

That was the beginning, I think, of my questioning the whole point of religion.

SpaceTime

My granny was the first de facto atheist in our household.
One of my uncles had a very serious childhood illness and was on death's door in a hospital and a local parish priest (in Dublin) called around to visit my granny.

At the time she only had 2 kids and he told her that the reason her kid was dying was because she was "refusing God's will" and using contraception.

She had to be physically dragged off the guy and he was very lucky she wasn't holding any heavy objects.

She never set foot in a church since and that was in the early 1950s!

robindch

I Heart Internet wrote: »

Most primary schools in England, especially in rural areas are under the management of the Church of England. One usually hears reports of people, from all religions and none, wanting to get their kids into them because the standard of education is so high. Just saying.

Statisticians have looked into this and it seems that the reason that schools controlled by religious factions score slightly better than schools that aren't, is that religiously-controlled schools block entry for low-achieving pupils. Thus skewing the results in their favour, while claiming that they're actually just preserving their "ethos".

The same statisticians then looked how pupils fared in religious and non-religiously controlled schools that also blocked low-achievers. They found that pupils in non-religious schools did better than their peers in religious schools, almost certainly because pupils in religious schools were being told to learn religious nonsense rather than something that contributed positively to their education.

I hope this helps you understand why schools controlled by religious factions appear to score better than ones that aren't.

SpaceTime

robindch wrote: »

Statisticians have looked into this and it seems that the reason that schools controlled by religious factions score slightly better than schools that aren't, is that religiously-controlled schools block entry for low-achieving pupils. Thus skewing the results in their favour, while claiming that they're actually just preserving their "ethos".

The same statisticians then looked how pupils fared in religious and non-religiously controlled schools that also blocked low-achievers. They found that pupils in non-religious schools did better than their peers in religious schools, almost certainly because pupils in religious schools were being told to learn religious nonsense rather than something that contributed positively to their education.

I hope this helps you understand why schools controlled by religious factions appear to score better than ones that aren't.

The other aspect is that you have to remember that many of them have barriers to entry e.g. small contributory fees and expensive uniforms and maybe far away from rough housing estates etc.
They may even just be off-putting to some people who would be a little, shall we say, low-brow / lazy or who do not fit into what they perceive to be the social class required for entry.

Remember, there's is still a very strong self-categorisation of social class that goes on in England. It's maybe less extreme in Ireland, but there's a subtle way of letting you know what your social standing is in some aspects of English society, especially education. That applies in Ireland too with various tiers of semi-private (state funded) schools.

So, you'll also find that the parents who make the effort to send their kids to that 'magic school' will also be the same parents who consider education an important issue and who will put lots of time in at home and create the right atmosphere conducive to learning.

The parents who don't give a toss, will be more likely to just send them to whatever school is handiest.

So, that has a huge skewing effect too.

The same argument gets used for single-sex schools in England too.

Statistics can be twisted to prove anything really if you don't analyse them particularly objectively.

robindch

old hippy wrote: »

In the 70s, one of my C of I classmates was beaten by the teacher when he couldn't say a Confirmation prayer. He wasn't even making his Confirmation.

I remember being assaulted by one unstable teacher in Killarney in, I suppose, 1978 because I couldn't say the "Hail Holy Queen" prayer. I don't recall telling my parents because, well, you just didn't do that kind of thing back then.

inocybe

SpaceTime wrote: »

The other aspect is that you have to remember that many of them have barriers to entry e.g. small contributory fees and expensive uniforms and maybe far away from rough housing estates etc.
They may even just be off-putting to some people who would be a little, shall we say, low-brow / lazy.

exactly the above. I know of people who had their children baptized just to get them away from the dreadful local schools. It's to do with perceived class and exclusiveness, not religion.

SpaceTime

robindch wrote: »

I remember being assaulted by one unstable teacher in Killarney in, I suppose, 1978 because I couldn't say the "Hail Holy Queen" prayer. I don't recall telling my parents because, well, you just didn't do that kind of thing back then.

I think a small % of teachers are just totally unprofessional. Schools need much more serious HR functions for weeding them out! I just hope that things have improved in terms of monitoring staff since the days I was in school. It's damaging to the profession and to the students to allow people to behave like that in a job.

My own early experiences of Irish primary school in the late 80s/90s:

Being held upside down over a bin as punishment.
Being yelled and screamed at for not paying attention (I was actually partially deaf at the time and couldn't hear what she was on about).
At age 4.5 being told if I didn't sit down I would be superglued to the ceiling (and actually believing it).
Same woman chased me around the classroom with a sweeping brush!
Having books and dusters thrown at me.
Being chased around by a crazed guy with a hurley (stick)!
Learning things by chanting them and having absolutely no idea what they meant e.g. Irish propositions.
Being made stand in the corner with a dunces cap on in the 1990s!! FFS (Again, this was because I couldn't hear what the crazy-woman was talking about due to a combination of a temporary hearing problem and her very thick accent).
One guy who used to 'freak out' where he'd go on a mad rant jumping on the desks and yelling and generally terrorising us.
Drifting off in a very boring class and having a football kicked at my head (by the teacher!)

Then several characters who I could only say were bordering on seriously creepy who brought up random completely inappropriate topics in class.

In the US on the other hand, the teachers wouldn't have been able to do that as there was very tight HR type monitoring went on. You always got the sense there was an actual management system in place, even as a small kid it was made explicitly clear that the principal and management office was always available should there be *any* problems and you had feedback meetings and stuff where the principal or the guidance councillor type character would come in and ask how everyone was getting on (without the teacher present)

Worst one *ever* in Ireland though was again in the early-mid 90s a friend of mine was getting absolutely unbelievable abuse from the teachers because he was very camp.
I told my mother about it who went in to the principal. The principal turned around and said "What do you expect me to do about it? The kid is bringing it on himself!" She was absolutely horrified at the response / totally inadequate reaction.

The guy changed to a mixed school and the abuse stopped.

I'm sure it wouldn't happen now, but I really think the Irish education system (in my own experience) has a hell of a lot of problems.

Sorry for going a bit OT, but I think the religious ethos issues are a big part of it, but I think we need to have much more forward-thinking schools that are open, welcoming environments and where management is ultimately accountable to the community (mostly parents, students and staff) not to a private religious organisation.

The current structure is just totally flawed if it's trying to deliver what is supposed to be a universal, public service in a cost-effective, high quality, accountable way.

Kiwi in IE

robindch wrote: »

I remember being assaulted by one unstable teacher in Killarney in, I suppose, 1978 because I couldn't say the "Hail Holy Queen" prayer. I don't recall telling my parents because, well, you just didn't do that kind of thing back then.

There are lots of these stories and they are just horrendous. When such a significant percentage of the population endured this type of abuse because of religious control, why is it allowed to continue today? It is an evil force in this society and nothing can convince me otherwise. My OH has horrendous stories of goings on in the 'Christian Brothers' school he attended. He escaped physical abuse other than what would have been, at the time universally acceptable 'corporal punishment', but he saw other kids seriously assaulted by these 'Christian Brother' pr**ks.

SpaceTime

Kiwi in IE wrote: »

There are lots of these stories and they are just horrendous. When such a significant percentage of the population endured this type of abuse because of religious control, why is it allowed to continue today? It is an evil force in this society and nothing can convince me otherwise. My OH has horrendous stories of goings on in the 'Christian Brothers' school he attended. He escaped physical abuse other than what would have been, at the time universally acceptable 'corporal punishment', but he saw other kids seriously assaulted by these 'Christian Brother' pr**ks.

Yeah, although a large amount of that was also down to absolute lack of accountability to any public body or authority too and an absolute lack of oversight by anyone more so than just the religious ethos.

I think the religious ethos didn't help and certainly contributed to the weird notions and atmosphere but the abuse was down to complete lack of transparency, accountability and an acceptance of physical attacks on students as normal.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Cabaal

Michael Nugent wrote: »

Taking a court case poses practical difficulties, because the Irish constitution (as interpreted by the Supreme Court) protects the churches, so a court case would probably have to go to the European Court of Human Rights. The timescale involved would mean that the child would probably have finished school by the time the case was resolved.
.

Its something that I think may ultimately need to be done,

I've no kids yet but its something i really worry about for if/when I do have kids and I've spoken to many people that are doing the religious thing because they know the difficulties doing the alternative would cause to them and their kids for the reasons you have outlined.

Is it worth forming a group to try and take a case in relation to this, its something that will have to be done eventually surely?

Whilst it may not help the OP during their kids lifetime in school, no doubt it would help others in the future.

Banbh

The very act of taking a case might prompt a response from government.
I don't think we should be put off because it will take time or because it may have to go to higher and higher courts. Some day somebody will have to do it.

Ruairi Quinn, as Minister for Education, could change things in the morning if the political will was there and if he were to see a serious challenge to Church control of education, he might be prompted to act.

I Heart Internet

robindch wrote: »

Statisticians have looked into this and it seems that the reason that schools controlled by religious factions score slightly better than schools that aren't, is that religiously-controlled schools block entry for low-achieving pupils. Thus skewing the results in their favour, while claiming that they're actually just preserving their "ethos".

The same statisticians then looked how pupils fared in religious and non-religiously controlled schools that also blocked low-achievers. They found that pupils in non-religious schools did better than their peers in religious schools, almost certainly because pupils in religious schools were being told to learn religious nonsense rather than something that contributed positively to their education.

I hope this helps you understand why schools controlled by religious factions appear to score better than ones that aren't.

I have no doubt that school communities "self-select" in the UK, so you'll have highly motivated families ensuring their kids go to the "better" COE school in hte neighbourhood. Even if that means faking an interest in God and the COE (there's a particularly good episode of the BBC comedy Rev that deals with this carry-on). It's a virtuous circle, more motivated and better performing kids go to these schools, the school performs better so more, brighter kids get sent there. In essence, it's not really about the religious ethos of the school at all. They are just perceived to be well run schools were kids get a good education. I wasn't suggesting that there is anything magical in the water at these schools that improve their results.

I personally don't buy this notion that, from a purely educational stand point, time spent "teaching religion" is wasted and of no benefit to the student (aside from any faith formation role). I would suggest that handled well (and it's probably not in most cases) introducing a child from an atheist family to religious thought and history could be quite useful. For example, knowledge of religious thought and scripture helps to inform studies in art, classical music, history and literature.

Gbear

SpaceTime wrote: »

Things like presentation of ideas is a huge part of the US system. You are presenting to the class, doing 'show and tell' activities, book reports, debates etc from a very early age and it does wonders for confidence and ability to communicate ideas.

I just think sometimes people here just go 'dumb Americans! Our system is vastly superior' which doesn't translate in terms of things like ability to get out and run a business.

At the same time you can become overconfident. I think the "dumb Americans" stereotype is to do with being encouraged to be too brash, confident and have too much of a sense of self-worth to the point of fantasy.
While it's the right direction I think a compromise between our self-loathing and deprecation and their unreality would be best.

SpaceTime wrote: »

The French education system is also 100% strictly secular and it works pretty effectively too. France generally does pretty well.

As a child I went through the French education system.
The primary was to a very high standard. Unfortunately my school was a bit rural. They were a bit backwards in some regards. My CM1 (4th class) teacher used to hit some of the kids. Just a slap every now and again and it probably didn't ruin any of us but it was wrong nonetheless.

However the secondary school I went to was amazing. It was an international school doing the International Baccalaureat. It was an environment of challenging and being challenged - the debate was really forward thinking (including debating the wearing of religious paraphenalia on campus - girls were not, as far as I can remember, allowed to weir the veil to school).
It was really hard at the time because I still hadn't got to grips with French and I'm a lazy bollocks but I remember it quite fondly.

Anyone moving to France need not worry on that front. I think the French have got a good thing going there. They've a tradition of education going back centuries. And of course a tradition of separation of church and state.

gaynorvader

I Heart Internet wrote: »

I have no doubt that school communities "self-select" in the UK, so you'll have highly motivated families ensuring their kids go to the "better" COE school in hte neighbourhood. Even if that means faking an interest in God and the COE (there's a particularly good episode of the BBC comedy Rev that deals with this carry-on). It's a virtuous circle, more motivated and better performing kids go to these schools, the school performs better so more, brighter kids get sent there. In essence, it's not really about the religious ethos of the school at all. They are just perceived to be well run schools were kids get a good education. I wasn't suggesting that there is anything magical in the water at these schools that improve their results.

I personally don't buy this notion that, from a purely educational stand point, time spent "teaching religion" is wasted and of no benefit to the student (aside from any faith formation role). I would suggest that handled well (and it's probably not in most cases) introducing a child from an atheist family to religious thought and history could be quite useful. For example, knowledge of religious thought and scripture helps to inform studies in art, classical music, history and literature.

As opposed to just teaching them art, classical music, history and literature?

I Heart Internet

gaynorvader wrote: »

As opposed to just teaching them art, classical music, history and literature?

For example, knowledge of religious thought and scripture helps to inform studies in art, classical music, history and literature.

Do you doubt that?

You could for example, of course, teach school kids about how beautiful Michelangelo's Pieta is in the abstract, but understanding the crucifiction story makes it more compelling and interesting, no?

gaynorvader

I Heart Internet wrote: »

Do you doubt that?

You could for example, of course, teach school kids about how beautiful Michelangelo's Pieta is in the abstract, but understanding the crucifiction story makes it more compelling and interesting, no?

Only if you find the crucifixion story compelling or interesting. Personally I found Carivaggio's Taking of Christ to be mind blowing, but it had nothing to do with the fact that it was Christ being taken. In fact, I didn't give a flying toss who the people in the painting were supposed to be any more than I gave a toss who the person in the Mona Lisa is supposed to be.

I don't doubt that there are some overlaps in the subjects you mentioned, but I seriously doubt that you'd gain more from knowing the religious stories than you would just learning the subjects. Certainly, without learning the subjects, you gain nothing of them from religious studies.

robindch

I Heart Internet wrote: »

You could for example, of course, teach school kids about how beautiful Michelangelo's Pieta is in the abstract, but understanding the crucifiction story makes it more compelling and interesting, no?

At the risk of explaining something that's been explained many, many times here:

I'm quite happy to have christian religious stories in school under the same general terms that other religious stories are included -- Greek gods, Norse gods, Jesus, Allah, Mohammad and the rest. They're the background of much of our culture and world culture generally, and they're important.

What I object to strongly, and you seem not to appreciate, is that there's a difference between telling people about religious stories, and telling impressionable kids that they'll burn in hell if they don't believe those religious stories.

I Heart Internet

gaynorvader wrote: »

Only if you find the crucifixion story compelling or interesting. Personally I found Carivaggio's Taking of Christ to be mind blowing, but it had nothing to do with the fact that it was Christ being taken. In fact, I didn't give a flying toss who the people in the painting were supposed to be any more than I gave a toss who the person in the Mona Lisa is supposed to be.

I don't doubt that there are some overlaps in the subjects you mentioned, but I seriously doubt that you'd gain more from knowing the religious stories than you would just learning the subjects. Certainly, without learning the subjects, you gain nothing of them from religious studies.

Fair enough.

I'm off to re-read Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech while listening to Handel's Messiah before attepting to tackle the question of whether a knowledge of religion might have any role in understanding Renaissance art again.

I Heart Internet

robindch wrote: »

What I object to strongly, and you seem not to appreciate, is that there's a difference between telling people about religious stories, and telling impressionable kids that they'll burn in hell if they don't believe those religious stories.

I share your view on that. What I said in my previous post was:

handled well (and it's probably not in most cases) introducing a child from an atheist family to religious thought and history could be quite useful. For example, knowledge of religious thought and scripture helps to inform studies in art, classical music, history and literature.

Kiwi in IE

gaynorvader wrote: »

Only if you find the crucifixion story compelling or interesting. Personally I found Carivaggio's Taking of Christ to be mind blowing, but it had nothing to do with the fact that it was Christ being taken. In fact, I didn't give a flying toss who the people in the painting were supposed to be any more than I gave a toss who the person in the Mona Lisa is supposed to be.

I don't doubt that there are some overlaps in the subjects you mentioned, but I seriously doubt that you'd gain more from knowing the religious stories than you would just learning the subjects. Certainly, without learning the subjects, you gain nothing of them from religious studies.

I completely agree here.

The religious context of the Sistine Chapel meant naught to me but that surely did not affect my appreciation of it. And after studying it in history class and art class at school, it was always near the top of my list of places to see.

Sulla Felix

robindch wrote: »

One easy option is to leave an iPad or something like that with the teacher so your child could play with that in class while everybody else is being told about what a nice chap this Jesus bloke is.

Cue protestations that the other kids might be jealous, that the school couldn't take responsibility for such an expensive item etc etc.

Banbh

I visited the Alhambra during the summer. If only I had gone to a compulsory Muslim school instead of the Christian Brothers I could have appreciated it so much more.

gaynorvader

Sulla Felix wrote: »

Cue protestations that the other kids might be jealous, that the school couldn't take responsibility for such an expensive item etc etc.

And yet if your kid took an iphone in with him you can be sure that they'd take it off him/her!

Clockwork Owl

I moved to Ireland from England just over a year ago, and I've got to say that the education system here is the biggest 'Huh?' moment I've experienced thus far.

Really hope the situation resolves itself soon, Kiwi!

Morag

robindch wrote: »

One easy option is to leave an iPad or something like that with the teacher so your child could play with that in class while everybody else is being told about what a nice chap this Jesus bloke is.

As you say, there's nothing "general" about indoctrination at this age -- it's specifically targeted at vulnerable, trusting minds because it works.

Nah I gave mine books for their reading level about Roman/Greek gods, stories about the Titans to Zeus and then Tales of the Æsir and then Egyptian gods and then Hindu gods. The local library had a heap of them.

One of mine got scold for saying Oh GOD, by one of the teachers who told her not to take the name of God in Vain they reply was that she was not talking about the Christian God but Kahlia who is WAY cooker cos she has blue skin lots of arms and rides a white tiger.

Far as mine are concerned the Christian god is one of many gods that many different people connect with, currently they are both agnostic.

I Heart Internet

Banbh wrote: »

I visited the Alhambra during the summer. If only I had gone to a compulsory Muslim school instead of the Christian Brothers I could have appreciated it so much more.

A sound basis in Islamic culture and religion may have allowed you to understand it better perhaps, maybe appreciate it more, yes.

I've just picked up a copy of Colm Toibin's Man Booker Prize short-listed Testament of Mary. I wonder if my understanding of this would be helped by knowing some of the back-story.

My point is, not that children should be thought religious education against their (and their parent's) will. I disagree with that can understand the OP's problem. My point was that, if a child does absorb some knowledge of religious thought, it's not necessarily a waste of time or a "nightmare" scenario.

Pawwed Rig

I would agree that a knowledge of religion would be essential in life. To study many topics, history for example, would require a certain amount of exposure to religious concepts to fully contextualise the topics being studied. One of my favourite paintings, for example, is The Last Supper by Da Vinci. It would be impossible to appreciate the meaning behind the painting without a grasp of the relevant protagonists. That is why I would support the teaching of religion as a subject but would strongly object to the indoctrination aspects that have been described in the thread so far.

Also, should my child ever decide to follow a religion then I would rather them have some starting point to make an informed choice as I would no assume that what I think is superior to what they will think once they reach an age where they have the cognitive ability to make informed decisions about their life.

robindch

I Heart Internet wrote: »

My point was that, if a child does absorb some knowledge of religious thought, it's not necessarily a waste of time or a "nightmare" scenario.

Again, you seem to ignore the possibility that this information is delivered in an emotionally threatening fashion.

Yes, tell them about religion. No, don't threaten hellfire if they don't believe it.

gaynorvader

You can learn the "backstory" to religious paintings in art class. Similarly you can learn the context to religious literature through English class. It is a waste of time learning about religion if you aren't covering religious art/text/whatever later on. If you do want to read a religious-based text, then you should inform yourself of the history behind it.

Morag

Morag wrote: »

One of mine got scold for saying Oh GOD, by one of the teachers who told her not to take the name of God in Vain

Surely his name is jesus/yahweh, not a generic term for a god...

mohawk

Morag wrote: »

One of mine got scold for saying Oh GOD,

This reminds me of the time my Granny completely lost it once when I used Jesus as a swear word. I was 5 at the time and I still remember being completely bewildered and thinking why is she screaming at me I didn't use a swear word!!

smacl

bluewolf wrote: »

Surely his name is jesus/yahweh, not a generic term for a god...

My youngest, a huge Futurama fan, goes with Bender's version, much to the dismay of her granny

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6aK15YLzyw

inocybe

If we're not careful there'll be a whole generation who won't appreciate Father Ted.
Down with this sort of thing!

Hotblack Desiato

^ I think that's inevitable in the future anyway.
It's really about the social attitudes etc. influenced by the RCC not the religion itself.
Would someone who wasn't here/too young to remember what daily life was like here in the 70s/80s even get half the jokes...?

pinkbear

I feel exactly like you Kiwi.

I chose to let my children sit through the religion classes, but reminded them at home "that's just what most of the people in your school believe, but different people have different beliefs, eg. ..." Both were fairly much atheists, without me ever telling them what I believed. When no. 1 came to communion time, she wasn't supposed to make it, and that was all fine until 2 weeks before hand. Then there were tears and she said she really wanted to make it, but she didn't want to disappoint us. We let her make it but tried not to make a big deal about it, and made her give half her money to charity.

A few years later, no. 1 was due for confirmation and no. 2 for communion. No. 1 had loved her communion and made a packet, so was adamant that she would be making confirmation. No. 2 was not in favour of making his communion at all, but they were a day apart, so it was difficult to explain to family that one was making confirmation but the other was opting out of communion. So we reluctantly went through both ceremonies.

This year no. 2 has confirmation. He's less shallow than no. 1, so he has put his foot down and said he won't make it. I told him I will give him money though, as I don't want him to be the only one in the class not going on a major spending spree.

I don't like going through the rubbish of Alive-O. But my kids weren't damaged or confused by it either. I would not have considered for a moment taking them out to find and ET for them.

(An aside. I am a secondary school teacher, and once got in trouble - well principal was at pains to point out that I wasn't "in trouble", just that it had been pointed out - for not receiving communion at our school mass which I attend every year. We also start all our staff meetings with a Hail Mary, which I object to but wouldn't dare say out loud. So it's not just primary school teachers who have to put up with this, though they do have it worse of course.)

SpaceTime

The big problem is that it can be quite subjective and completely dependent on who the teacher and the principal is.

I know that I've heard stories where teachers have been exceptionally accommodating and absolutely bent over backwards to makes sure that a non-Catholic kid could opt out of all that stuff without making a big deal out of it.

Then you've the other extreme where the teacher or principal is a bit of a religious zealot and becomes really awkward about it or just thinks the kid or parents are making a big fuss about nothing or are trying to make their child 'different'. It's probably happening somewhat less than it used to because of raised awareness that it could result in a big issue with negative PR consequences for the school, but it's quite possible to encounter someone who is just like "Well this is a Catholic School, what do you expect!?" or "Why are you making life awkward for your poor child because of your weird beliefs! Would you not just let him/her make his communion / confirmation"

I also think that there's a tendency to have more respect for a kid/parent's wishes where the kid is of another faith rather than just not religious which some of them seem to see as some kind of failure of the parent / laziness.

I don't really think that's good enough in what's supposed to be a public school system.

This is exactly the kind of thing that the Catholic community was up in arms about in the 19th century becuase of accusations that the Church of Ireland was proselytising through the school system and other services at the time leading to demands for Catholic Schools etc. However, when the shoe's on the other foot, they're fine about it and can't see the problem much like their 19th century protestant counterparts thought what they were doing was 100% fine and that everyone else was just being awkward.

Banbh

I'm happy that we stood up for what we believe to be right. The kids never saw conformity or cow-towing for personal gain as something good. And they were never confused by Alivo-O and the other rubbish as they never had anything to do with it.

In fact, I'm proud that they were in some small way an inspiration for their pals and even some parents and teachers. Eldest is now off to college as an independent, determined, open-minded young woman.

pinkbear

I feel exactly like you Kiwi.

I chose to let my children sit through the religion classes, but reminded them at home "that's just what most of the people in your school believe, but different people have different beliefs, eg. ..." Both were fairly much atheists, without me ever telling them what I believed. When no. 1 came to communion time, she wasn't supposed to make it, and that was all fine until 2 weeks before hand. Then there were tears and she said she really wanted to make it, but she didn't want to disappoint us. We let her make it but tried not to make a big deal about it, and made her give half her money to charity.

A few years later, no. 1 was due for confirmation and no. 2 for communion. No. 1 had loved her communion and made a packet, so was adamant that she would be making confirmation. No. 2 was not in favour of making his communion at all, but they were a day apart, so it was difficult to explain to family that one was making confirmation but the other was opting out of communion. So we reluctantly went through both ceremonies.

This year no. 2 has confirmation. He's less shallow than no. 1, so he has put his foot down and said he won't make it. I told him I will give him money though, as I don't want him to be the only one in the class not going on a major spending spree.

I don't like going through the rubbish of Alive-O. But my kids weren't damaged or confused by it either. I would not have considered for a moment taking them out to find and ET for them.

(An aside. I am a secondary school teacher, and once got in trouble - well principal was at pains to point out that I wasn't "in trouble", just that it had been pointed out - for not receiving communion at our school mass which I attend every year. We also start all our staff meetings with a Hail Mary, which I object to but wouldn't dare say out loud. So it's not just primary school teachers who have to put up with this, though they do have it worse of course.)

smacl

My eldest, in 2nd year in a Catholic girls school, for religion homework recently had to write an essay on the ways in which religion affected her life. She wrote a small note on the top of the page explaining that as an atheist, religion didn't affect her life, and wrote an essay on the discovery of the Higgs Boson instead. I'd dearly love to know how that one went down in the staff room, and look forward to the next parent teacher meeting. FWIW, she also got the award for best academic results in the year last year, and gets on very well in the school and with her classmates and teachers, so outside of the odd spark, the Catholic education seems to suit her quite well. I was rather surprised, and expected she'd want to ditch it after a year, but horses for courses and all that.