Church needs an education in humility
In particular, how it is addressing the changing landscape of education leaves one wondering whether they have learned anything from the decades in which the crozier held considerable power in this country.
This is not a column designed to bash the Church. Nor is the column going to propound that the Church should have no role in education.
Far from it. There is still, in this country, a minority of people of child-rearing age, or younger, who practise the Catholic faith.
The size of the cohort is not determinable, but those people are perfectly entitled to have easy access to a Catholic education for their offspring.
As things stand, this cohort are catered for more than amply. In fact, the big problem is catering for everybody else.
This includes those who may be culturally Catholic, but no longer practice, nor feel any burning desire that their children be educated through a Catholic ethos.
It also includes the rapidly growing numbers of people who proactively want a secular education for their children.
One subsection of the latter are those who want to rear their children as Catholic, but acquiesce to having religious instruction, particularly on the sacraments, administered outside school hours.
These parents are committed to the unique perspective of actually living their religion. Instead of sub-contracting out religious instruction, they engage in it and commit their time.
It is in this evolving milieu that the conduct of the Church is either baffling or highly cynical.
The Catholic Church controls 92% of the country’s 3,200 primary schools. In a changed landscape, it might have concluded that its loyalty should be to those who are committed to the religion.
Thus, the chosen path would be to divest patronage of a large number of schools, retreat to those who are genuine adherents, and perhaps instill an ethos in the remaining schools that genuinely reflect the religion.
You might think that such an approach would be sensible, apart from anything else. Instead, all the evidence is that the Church is more concerned with retaining influence, if not power, over the large number of people who are beyond the fold.
This week, the ludicrous predicament of parents around the country who want a secular education for their children was highlighted once again.
Five Educate Together schools have been told that they can only accommodate half a stream of pupils — numbering 13 — in the coming school year, irrespective of demand.
The schools are in Trim, Co Meath; Tramore, Co Waterford; New Ross, Co Wexford; Tuam, Co Galway; and Castlebar, Co Mayo.
In those towns, parents have been told that, due to a Department of Education rule, their chances of a secular education for their children are highly restricted.
As RTÉ’s Emma O’Kelly reported, during the week, the reason for the restriction is to ensure that the existing Catholic schools are not “adversely impacted” by falling numbers.
Does anybody believe that the department came up with such a rule without a word, whispered or otherwise, from elements within the Church intent on protecting whatever it is they want to protect?
The five schools are among just a handful which have been divested of patronage from the Church, since the establishment of the Forum on Patronage and Pluralism, in 2011.
The forum was to be a vehicle to reconfigure patronage to reflect the changing populace. Yet, in the last six years, the Church has just divested nine out of 3,000 schools.
Repeatedly, the Church’s representatives have stated that the impasse has been down to parents. In 2012, parents in five areas were surveyed to detect attitudes to changing patronage of schools.
This was followed by a wider survey of 23 other areas.
Generally, the plummeting religious observation among the public was not reflected in a huge appetite for change.
On one level, this is entirely understandable. Parents want a good education and a happy environment for their children. If they are not unhappy, why risk change?
However, even within that context, results were manipulated.
When O’Kelly inquired of the department why the rule in the five towns was in place, she was told that the surveys had found that there was demand for “up to half a stream”.
She went and checked the results, which stated the demand was for “at least half a stream”.
This is an entirely different result. And, apart from that, the demand for places in those towns currently far exceeds the supply of just 13 places.
So, now that the parents are not providing the results that the Church would like to see, their choices no longer take precedence.
For those forced to avail of a Catholic education in these towns, there is another issue. In order to be guaranteed a place, they must have their children baptised.
In effect, baptism in the Catholic Church is a form of entrance exam for prospective pupils.
Whether or not their parents have any adherence to the religion, or even any desire to have their children raised Catholic, is entirely irrelevant.
Recognising this aspect of a ludicrous situation, the Education Minister Richard Bruton, recently signalled that he wants an end to the “baptism barrier”.
The response from some quarters of the Church has been outrage that a politician would attempt to interfere in how the Church conducts its business.
In this warped interpretation, the State is attempting to intrude on the sanctity of the Church, rather than the reality, which, in today’s Ireland, is the other way around.
In essence, the Catholic Church’s approach to a changing landscape in education has been entirely cynical.
The public stance is one of acceptance and co-operation.
Yet, in practice, every move has been made to shore up a policy of ‘what we have, we hold’.
It’s an approach that is just not unChristian, but which displays contempt for the growing cohort of parents who want the State to provide a secular education for their children.
The situation with the five towns also illustrates that the Church retains an unhealthy influence in the corridors of power, and which is being exercised to deny parents their rights.
Faced with such an approach, it is incumbent on the Government to act in the best interests of the citizenry.
Quite obviously, the Church has been running rings around the State, in dealing with this matter. When it comes to politics, the Church can draw on 2,000 years of experience in getting its way.
It’s high time that the government of the day began looking after the interests of all the people, as a priority, in this area.
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