A chara, – Eoin O'Loughlin (October 2nd) asks how I would feel if "children of Catholic parents had to attend Muslim or Jewish school". Perhaps he should ask a Catholic parent that question. For my own part, two of my children attend the local community school, which has a Catholic ethos, and I find it to be extremely inclusive. Indeed they invite me, as the local Church of Ireland rector, to take part in all the school services, and the school chaplain has been very welcoming of my being involved with the school in other ways as well. So having some experience of being "on the other side of the fence", as Mr O'Loughlin puts it, I am far from being "blasé"; rather I am grateful for the flexibility displayed daily by our system.
Mr O’Loughlin ends his letter by wondering why Ireland can’t have a “secular education system” just like Turkey does. The Turkish system accords with its constitution even as ours does with ours; this means that in Turkey the teaching of religion in primary and secondary school is mandatory, with mainly Sunni theology being taught, overseen, if I understand correctly, by their directorate of religious affairs, which is under the authority of the prime minister’s office. As such it is not, perhaps, quite the secular model that Mr O’Loughlin is after. – Is mise,
Rev PATRICK G BURKE,
Castlecomer,
Co Kilkenny.