Church's role in primary schools

Madam, – Fr Seán McDonagh and Andrew Carvill write separately (January 28th) decrying your supposed campaign to remove the Catholic…

Madam, – Fr Seán McDonagh and Andrew Carvill write separately (January 28th) decrying your supposed campaign to remove the Catholic Church’s influence from our primary school system. In both cases they reference the countless hours volunteered by members of boards of management throughout the country as a reason to maintain the status quo.

Nobody I know of denies that the vast majority of these volunteers have had a positive influence on our education system. But the fact remains that they bring this positive influence under the aegis of an organisation that has actively facilitated the molestation of generations of children.

If they are prepared to volunteer their time and efforts outside of the influence of the Catholic Church then they should be welcomed. Until that time they should be excluded from our schools as a direct consequence of the findings of the Murphy report. – Yours, etc,

JAMES SCULLY-LANE,

Bellevue Lawn,

Delgany,

Co Wicklow.

Madam, – It was mildly entertaining to read the opinions of the several Catholic priests (Opinion Letters, January 28th) complaining of bias in the recent Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI survey on the future of the primary school system, considering that all these opinions were from leaders of an organisation which has a significant vested interest in maintaining the status quo.

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Unfortunately, none chose to deal with the central issue of whether it is appropriate for the patronage system to continue to exist in the first place.

It cannot be denied that the patronage system provides a highly convenient forum for the propagation of religious beliefs to our children; nor that the churches are fully entitled to express their opinion on maintaining the system. Nevertheless, if taxpayers’ money were to be used to fund religious instruction in any other context, there would be a national outcry.

Lest this survey appear to be part of “a campaign to push the Catholic church out of education”, I would point out we already have two forums for providing religious instruction: the home and the church. If these together are insufficient, then either parents or church leaders are not living up to their professed beliefs. – Is mise,

NICK HILLIARD,

De Courcey Square,

Glasnevin,

Dublin 9

.