Sir, - The continuing broadside on the Christian Brothers by your columnists is becoming tiresome. Messrs Oliver and Humphries (EL, May 9th) shed little new light on this teaching religious order. One could conclude from your tabloid supplement that the Christian Brothers held a franchise on the use of the leather strap. This is not so. Lay teachers in many "non-religious" national and secondary schools used the leather trap, cane and pointer with impunity to discipline their pupils.
It is to the shame of successive Ministers for Education that they sanctioned such behaviour. It is also to the shame of the Irish National Teachers' Organisation and the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland who represented these teachers that no action was taken to end this violence. That they have never to this day addressed the sadistic and unacceptable behaviour of some of their members is a reflection on their lack of courage.
The first prosecution of a lay teacher for acts of violence against children in the 1950s and 1960s will prove our maturity as a people to address all wrong-doing from whatever quarter against all children in this period and perhaps demonstrate to the Christian Brothers that they are not being scapegoated. - Yours, etc.
Ciaran Coleman, Dalkey, Co Dublin.