Colm O'Connor: Protection of religious rights in all schools is a concern

The need for substantial divestment through transparent public processes is increasingly clear, writes Colm O’Connor

Only 13% of surveyed teachers attended Mass weekly and nearly 69% spent less time on religion than was required by the syllabus.

DURING this Catholic Schools’ Week, I’ll be reflecting on the fact that, for the past five years, my daughter has not been able to walk to our publicly funded village school with her friends but instead has to be driven to an equality-based primary school in a nearby town. This disruptive and unnecessary commute has not been the free expression of our ‘parental choice’. We did not want to move her or her brother, but we had no choice if we wanted to protect them from daily religious indoctrination.

I have written previously about how this indoctrination complicated our family’s ability to process our grief following the death of one of our children, but our story is far from unique.