8,575 log on to renounce religion
Latest figures from www.countmeout.ie show that 8,575 people have completed “declaration of defection” forms to allow them to leave the Church.
The latest numbers on those using the facility follows new allegations of cover-up against the head of the Catholic Church in Ireland, Seán Brady, as well as the resignations of a number of bishops.
The website asks people to fill in their names on electronic documentation used to resign from the Church before downloading it.
Catholics can then download the documents and request their local bishop to have their baptismal certificate amended.
Numbers filling in the declarations to resign have doubled in just more than three months, from 4,250 in December.
According to the latest census figures available, there are 1.8 million Roman Catholics in the state.
Since July 2009 when the website went live, its founders claim it has had just under 91,000 visits.
Co-founder Cormac Flynn said: “We see a spike in visitors during news events concerning the Church and, unsurprisingly, that’s been the case in the last month. In the first half of the month our average daily number of unique visitors was around 150.”
A victim of paedophile Brendan Smyth this month backed calls for Cardinal Seán Brady to resign over revelations that he knew about the priest’s abuse of children for almost 20 years. The scandal emerged following revelations that Cardinal Brady questioned two young victims of Smyth in 1975 as part of a secret inquiry.
Organisers behind the website claim their goal is to provide information on the defection process and also to provoke a debate on the issues of identity and religion in Ireland.
On average, about 1,000 forms are being downloaded a month, a figure which has increased significantly since the start of the year, claim the site’s owners.
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