Cathal BarryJust 200 of the existing 3,300 primary schools would be needed to serve parents who want a non-religious education for their children, it has been claimed.
Secretary of the Church of Ireland Board of Education, Dr Ken Fennelly, said figures from the Central Statistics Office, seen by The Irish Catholic, indicated that 27,238 parents with a child of between the ages of five and 12 were “expressly no religion”. Dr Fennelly noted that this equated to the number of Protestant children in the same age-bracket in the country.
“Given that less than 200 schools is enough to serve the Protestant minority then it would not be, in my estimation, too much of a leap to say that the same number would serve non-religious parents,” he said.
Speaking at an event on denominational education hosted by The Iona Institute, Dr Fennelly said “it is evident that providing a network of schools under an alternative patronage in towns and villages up and down the country presents a significant practical challenge”.
Meanwhile, Prof. Eamonn Conway of Mary Immaculate in Limerick has described as “bizarre” proposals to teach a compulsory world religions course in primary schools, including faith-based schools, called Education about Religions and Beliefs (ERB).
Speaking at the same event, Prof. Conway said its introduction in faith-based schools “would undoubtedly adversely affect religious instruction and characteristic ethos”.
“It is bizarre, in my view, that a faith-based school would be required to offer what is essentially a secularist understanding of religious faith,” he said.