Religion and Engaging with the Teacher

If people of other religions and no religion were 'left to it' by catholic schools, that would be great. But we're not left to it - we're required either to join in or be left out of key school events, because of a different religion or no religion. That's just not on.

Andrew, if you choose to send your child to a religious denominated school, and the school has an optional event, you have the additional choice whether your child partakes or not. That is your choice. It is not valid for you to choose to opt out ad then moan that you didn't take part. You've made a lot of choices to end up at that particular imagined predicament. If you want to use your own child as a pawn, again it is your choice.

Couldn't agree more. "Happy to go along with it" sums up the problem. It's exactly why 90% of our primary schools are still Catholic and (incredibly) we're still letting them take on the running of new schools. No one gives a shyte about the religious aspects but it still gives the Catholic Church enormous power over our kids, just so the grandparents aren't upset and they can have a bouncy castle for the Communion.

And those of us who do object are made to feel like the odd ones out?

Enormous power over our kids? in what way, are they building an army of pre teens?

Given how little irish people generally care about religion now considering it was far more likely we all went to mass every week and the church had far more influence, how likely is it that our children will 'indoctrinated' ?

you dont have to expect them to do anything, but i take it you are actively preventing them from doing this.

as i said, if you want to be put out or outraged work away, if it bothers you that much find a different school, if it doesnt then drink the kool aid. Life is too short, unless you are a devout catholic and you believe it is never ending.

There is no 'different school'. 90% of schools are catholic schools. The tiny number of multi-denom schools are oversubscribed and limited by catchment areas. There is no other option for a different school.

Life is too short to have kids sitting through prayers, lessons, ceremonies for a religion that doesn't apply to them.

You can take up your proposal of out-of-school activitives with Andrew who holds the position that it wouldn't be fair for his children to miss out on any organised events that he is after choosing to opt out of.

What about the parents who currently support the setup as is? You then asking them to disrupt their families and supports and community connections for your beliefs and viewpoints?

Is the best solution not a mix of schools for parents rather than a forced secular education model which you appear to be suggesting or am I wrong?

Basically,

Maybe im picking you and Hotblack up wrong, but is it in your view (and i believe ye may be leading the charge on this over on the A&A forum?) that their should be no state funded Catholic lead schools?

Edit: just to added an extra line or two to make more clear

Is the best solution not a mix of schools for parents rather than a forced secular education model

Yes, it would be. However with 90% of primary schools run by the Catholic Church, it will take decades to achieve that mix.

In the interim, the charade continues and these absolute cnuts still get to claim to be relevant in modern Ireland.

It's not right.

You were only whinging a few posts back that your little darling felt left out after you didn't let them partake in events and therefore that was another moaning point. If they have Saturday classes teaching the current religion curriculum, you'll then be moaning that it's not fair on your special little bundle of joy because they can't attend those because you won't let them. And therefore nobody else should be allowed to attend them.

Next thing we hear, you'll be trying to send your kid to Blackrock College, only to forbid them from playing rugby, and then mounting a petition that the school has to abandon its tradition in its entirety because it isn't fair on your kid that everyone else in the school is playing it and they get left out. Rather than having the cop on to think before you send them.

That poster explicitly admitted a few pages back that they would want to implement a situation where children attending a school which had Catholic patronage would be denied their Constitutionally protected right to an education

Did you not know that you can:

A) Choose to send your child to a different school (or homeschool)

B) Choose to send them to any given school but take them out when religion classes are on?

Glad to have cleared that up for you. All good now?

Usually when people try to invoke a strawman, they construct one which is actually true. In your case, you are depending on one that is not true

If you join the army you wear the boots. If you sent you children to a Catholic ethos school you accept that. If not you send them elsewhere. I have seen parents send children to a post primary school 10-15 miles away. I live near a small town with am excellent PP school and yet I see parents by pass it to send children into an all girls school in the city or a in the case of boys to a prestigious mixed school.

There is another poster on about the inclusiveness of ET schools just because they give a secular play at Christmas. What the point of trying to celebrate Christmas if it is not in you faith believe. Maybe they should also face the other way from Mecca in the morning for to copy a Muslim prayer or have an alternative Passover ceremony.

The answer to the complaint that there’s too much crammed into the curriculum is not to remove something that used not be a problem. It’s to stop cramming more things into the curriculum when they’re not needed and in many cases, not wanted.

The schools are not “indoctrinating” the students. The parents are choosing to raise their children Catholic (or wherever other religion) and want their children taught the details by trained professional teachers, like all of the other subjects most parents don’t have enough expert knowledge to teach their children themselves. If you think children will believe what their teacher tells them when their parents regularly contradict it, you’re clearly either not a teacher, or you’ve never taught students with parents who contradict the school’s teachings.

And as has already been pointed out, the students are not forced to attend, and you know this. You have a choice to either send them to another school or take them out of school during religion classes. If you’re not willing to do either, you clearly don’t feel strongly enough about it to justify catering to your wishes over those of the majority.

How many times do I have to explain that there is no "school elsewhere". 90% of schools are church schools, and the remainder, the tiny number of ET schools are heavily oversubscribed with catchment area rules.

People have been celebrating Christmas long before Christianity, and will be doing so long after Christianity has faded away, if we haven't destroyed our planet in the meantime. It is about the time of year, not a mythical story.

I do find it very odd RealJohn that you'd rather have religious instruction delivered by a teacher who may not believe in it or want to teach it (but is forced to) rather than a person selected by the parish and willing to do so.

It's even more bizarre that you and Cyrus maintain that religious instruction during the school day should be retained while also accepting the fact that most kids end up rejecting religion. That just proves it's a massive waste of time.

Irish kids spend far more time on religion in school than in most other countries. Well, apart from Islamic republics...

It's a waste of valuable and limited time and resources, and a large and increasing proportion of parents and teachers regard it as a complete farce. But only a small percentage of schools don't force everyone to go along with this farce while pretending Ireland is still in the 1950s.

I’d rather have all education delivered by a professional teacher who’s an expert at imparting knowledge to students. The person with the most knowledge in a subject is not always the person best placed to impart that knowledge.

I also never said that most students reject religion. In my experience, an awful lot of people who weren’t particularly fussed about religion when they were young (not necessarily reject it, but didn’t really care) see its value when they get older.

What I did say is that if they’re being told the opposite by their parents, they rarely decide that the teacher is more likely to be right (even though they often are). This obviously doesn’t just apply to religion. It’s just more likely to come up in the context of religion.

It's ironic to say the least that baptism rates are cited as 'proof' of demand for catholic schools, when until a few years ago there was a real possibility of your child having great difficulty getting any school place if not baptised - and excluding kids purely on the basis of not being baptised was legal.

Baptism rates are falling but no doubt some people are still under the impression that it may be necessary for a school place, and that perception will take some time to fully fade away.

Marriage is where couples have a real choice with no consequences (apart from possibly annoying mother-in-law) and fewer than half of marriages are now religious marriages. Yet when they come to enrol their kids in a school they'll be still faced with a system where over 90% of schools are religious patronage and teach it as fact during the school day for approx. 10% of teaching hours.

It's crazy and it's completely indefensible. A majority of people silently going along with something (where they have no other choice) is NOT consent or agreement or a good reason to keep doing something because it was the way things were done >100 years ago.

The real reason for the vehement rearguard action in defence of the status quo is, as Renko mentioned, this: