Secular Sunday #45 – In the Papers

Author Secular Sunday Published 04/11/2012

Welcome to the latest Secular Sunday!

In this issue:

News

The Department of Education has launched a survey to determine what schools people want in their area. While this is far from the ideal solution of secular state-provided education, it is currently all that’s on offer. The areas where a change of patronage is proposed are Arklow, Castlebar, Tramore, Trim and Whitehall (including Kilmore West and Beaumont). If you are a parent of a school-age or younger child in one of those areas, you can vote for the patron you prefer here.
For general information on the state of education in Ireland and what you can do about it see our Teach, Don’t Preach website and Facebook page. (See below for a couple of recent newspaper articles on the subject.)
Sanal Edamaruku, president of Rationalist International, will be in Ireland as a guest of Atheist Ireland from the 22nd to the 27th of November, and we hope to host a number of public events around the country during his stay. We’ll have more news on that within the next few days.

Upcoming Events

Today, Sunday 4 November, 4:00 pm, Buswell’s Hotel, Dublin 2 (map)
The monthly meeting of the Humanist Association of Ireland. All are welcome. This is to be followed at 5:30 pm by their AGM (for members only). Facebook event page
Monday 5 November, 8:30 pm, McSwiggans Bar and Restaurant, Woodquay, Galway (map)
Galway Skeptics in the Pub #44. More science and skepticism. Facebook event page
Saturday 10 November, 2:00 pm, Buswell’s Hotel, Dublin 2 (map)
Atheist Ireland strategy workshop. We will be meeting to discuss some of the ideas that came up at our AGM, particularly ways of increasing our membership base, spreading information about our activities and goals, and making our organisation more inclusive and accessible.
Wednesday 21 November, 8:00 pm, Absolute Hotel, Sir Harry’s Mall, Limerick (map)
The Mid West Humanists are meeting to talk about life as an atheist or humanist in a society with a religious-biased culture, and are continuing their plan to meet TDs in the region, once the Constitutional Convention begins and gets to the Blasphemy item. All are welcome.

What the Papers Say

There has been a considerable and varied response to Joe Humphreys’ Irish Times article on atheism and Atheist Ireland. Atheist Ireland’s chairman Michael Nugent wrote a response that appeared on Monday. There were some rather negative letters on Tuesday (prepare to facepalm hard), with some more balanced and thoughtful responses on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Discussion of atheism and Atheist Ireland in such a widely-read newspaper is very welcome.
On the ever-present topic of school patronage, there’s an excellent article by Fintan O’Toole in Tuesday’s Irish Times, and a great piece by Jane Donnelly, Atheist Ireland’s Education Policy Officer, in The Journal on Thursday.