Making education more secular: Patronage a relic of an old dominance

THE divisive issue of school patronage is unlikely to lead to riots on the streets anytime soon but it is, nevertheless, symbolic of the friction generated when Ireland’s tectonic plates collide. 

It may be a tad simplistic to suggest this issue represents a rearguard action by an older, conservative Ireland confronted by the new, rainbow Ireland, one unhappy with principles of triumphalist segregation accepted by our great-grandparents in another time. That description is, in the most general terms at least, pretty accurate, though.

Some 96% of this Republic’s primary schools remain under religious patronage — control — and about 90% of those are under the patronage of the Catholic church. Not even the most ardent Catholic advocate could argue that 90% of the population remain active, committed Catholics today. The real ratio may not be even half that 90% figure.

This schools’ management system, one funded in its entirety by the public purse, supports a process where religious background, or indifference to religion, can be the decisive factor in whether or not a child might be admitted to their local national school or not. It is difficult to think of another area of Irish life where this kind of segregation, this kind of arbitrary belief-based exclusion is tolerated. It is also difficult to accept it is legal or that this you’re-not-one-of-us winnowing would survive a court challenge — and even if it did, it is even harder to imagine that European courts would support it. It is even more difficult to understand why such a challenge has not yet materialised.

That so many parents have children baptised today, not to mark a rite of passage, but to ensure their child might not lose a place in a local national school to a child from outside their catchment, but who has been baptised, puts dishonesty at the centre of our child-rearing and educational practice. These flag-of-convenience declarations of belief, where there is none, also offer an appalling example to our children.

In an effort to resolve this situation, one that was not settled by legislation introduced just last year, Education Minister Richard Bruton will today detail plans aimed at resolving the “baptism barrier” and to try to better reflect the diversity so evident today. This diversity is underlined by a simple statistic. Over a third of the couples choosing to get married today do so in a non-religious environment. Tragically, many of those couples will, if today’s rules persist, feel obliged to have their children baptised. That school patrons indulge this charade raises many sharp questions too.

The bitterness once again bubbling to the surface north of the border and the absolute need, if only for selfish reasons, to assimilate effectively those fleeing war or poverty in faraway places into this society, means this convention must be broken so social unity and common purpose prevail.

The greatest irony, and possibly the greatest tragedy, in this is that by insisting that it continues to enjoy its privileged position the Catholic church is doing more than any other entity to hasten the day when its role in our schools comes to an end. It should learn to co-operate, rather than try to dominate, it should recognise that our world has changed utterly.