The Religious Angle to Schools

Catholic and Proud of it!

Take a look at the old Irish £5 note (now displaced by the euro) and you'll see something unique among the currencies of the world. The picture embossed on the bill was not of a president or king. Instead, the scene is a classroom presided over by a Nun.

Irish education began in earnest only after a century of repression when the law forbade Catholic children to attend school. It was the church which resurrected the great tradition of the sixth through ninth centuries when Ireland was a land of "Saints and Scholars."

Most schools today are national schools presided over by the secular Department of Education, but the Catholic ethos is deeply embedded in the school system. There is no separation of church and state. It is the school which prepares children for their first Communion and Confirmation. Every class begins with a prayer, and Religion class, often taught by members of the religious orders, is required until graduation from high school.

Non-Catholic and Proud of it!

Nonetheless, different traditions are respected. For those seeking alternatives, in Dublin there are Moslem schools, Hebrew Schools, and Protestant institutions of learning. For those in the countryside, there is a tradition of tolerance within the schools.

My older daughter, who is not Catholic, never faced the slightest dollop of prejudice. As a matter of fact, in our local Catholic schools are Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Protestants, Jews and, most recently, a few Muslims.

It's one reason the North's history of religious bigotry is so alien to folks down South.

For those not happy with the situation, check out Educate Together's website.