Jennifer Carroll McNeill TD says sex education should be objective and fact-based

The new RSE programme for Catholic primary schools highlights the impact religion has on State education as a result of our current school patronage model, according to Jennifer Carroll MacNeill TD of Fine Gael.
Flourish, the relationships and sexuality education programme for junior infants to sixth class, has been developed for use in State schools under Catholic patronage.
Deputy Carroll MacNeill says: “The patronage of a school defines its ethos, and the Flourish programme highlights the challenges that our current school patronage model can present. The programme outlines it’s vision that “there is no such thing as an ‘ethos free’ approach to RSE since it must be rooted in a particular value system.”
She has already received multiple communications from parents who are not religious themselves, and do not wish for their children’s education to be rooted in exclusively Catholic values, particularly those aspects that relate to sexual education.
With a significant majority of State schools under the patronage of the Catholic church, parents are often left with no choice but to send their children to publicly funded Catholic schools.
“Some parents may have no religious beliefs, whilst many may also come from different religious backgrounds. Our current model of patronage and education leaves little room for choice for this growing number of families,” Deputy Carroll McNeill says. “In particular when it comes to relationship and sexual education, we need to ensure that our children are receiving a fact-based, pluralist education.”
“We already know that not everyone in our school communities feels supported and accepted. We recently heard from the INTO of thousands of LGBT teachers who are hiding their sexuality due to the fear that some school patron bodies believe their sexuality is “intrinsically disordered.”
“The Flourish programme refers to “the Church’s teaching in relation to marriage between a man and a woman”, which does not take into account the diversity of relationships and families the Irish state legally recognises and protects. It is anachronistic that education in State schools would be behind or set against the reality of the laws of the State. We need to create space in society for every person of every faith and background, but State services should be secular.
“During his time as Minister for Education, Richard Bruton announced a major review of the RSE curriculum in primary and secondary schools. He called on the National Council on Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) to give particular consideration to a number of issues including consent, healthy and positive sexual expression and relationships, and LGBTQ+ matters,” concludes Deputy Carroll MacNeill.
“This announcement was back in 2018, and we are still awaiting the NCCA’s redevelopment of the RSE curriculum. In July 2020, I received a PQ reply from Minister Foley which stated the NCCA was to begin its work on a single integrated curriculum for RSE and SPHE early in the 2020/21 school year. We are yet to see the publication of this new curriculum and I would ask that Minister Foley work with the NCCA to expedite the process.” Read online…

Catholic Bishop asks if Church should stop trying to convert secular society. They could start with schools.

Atheist Ireland welcomes the Pastoral Reflection by the Bishop of Clonfert, Michael Duignan, about changes in the Catholic Church, which Patsy McGarry reports on in today’s Irish Times.
Bishop Duignan says that in the past, the Church tried to “engage with and convert secular society” but perhaps it was now time to “seriously engage with and convert ourselves and the way we live as a Christian community within that secular society”.
He adds that the church should “muster the courage to free ourselves from many of the things we are currently doing that are no longer fruitful and that are, at times, counterproductive”.
One way of moving forward would be for Church and State to stop teaching the children of atheists and secularists to develop values to enable them to come to an understanding of religion to their lives and to become aware of different understanding of the divine.
Atheists don’t believe there is such a thing as the divine. This Religious Education course is an exam subject at Junior and Leaving Certificate level. Church and state claim it is suitable for all religions and none.
If your aim is to convert the children from atheist and secular families, then of course you would believe that such a course was suitable for their children.
The main aim of second level Religious Education is:
“Religious Education aims to develop knowledge, understanding, skills, attitudes and values to enable young people to come to an understanding of religion and its relevance to life, relationships, society and the wider world.”
If the main aim of any course was to develop knowledge, understanding, skills, attitudes and values to enable young people to come to an understanding of atheism and its relevance to life, relationships, society and the wider world, then it would immediately be seen as trying to convert children to atheism.
If the Catholic Church does decide to stop trying to convert atheists and secularists, then a good start would be to let their children opt out of attending Religious Education in schools that they currently run, and offer them another subject instead. Read online…

Parents in Cork want objective sex education, not the Catholic Flourish course

Atheist Ireland asks Government to legislate for objective sex education

Atheist Ireland has written the following letter to all Government Ministers, TDs and Senators. Please contact your own TD or Senator and ask them to support legislation for objective sex education.

Dear Minister, TD, Senator,

The Programme for Government commits to make legislative changes, if necessary, to ensure inclusive Relationship and Sexuality Education in schools. These legislative changes are now clearly necessary, in light of the publication of the Flourish RSE course by the Catholic Bishops, and for other reasons that we outline here.

These legislative changes were recommended by the Oireachtas Joint Education Committee and other bodies. They involve amending the Education Act to ensure that religious ethos cannot influence children’s right to objective sex education, and amending the Employment Equality Act to protect teachers from being disciplined for not upholding the religious ethos of schools.

We ask the Government to do this, and we ask TDs and Senators to support this.

Contents of this document

1. Overview
2. The Current Position
3. The Flourish Course
4. Why Legislative Changes are Necessary
5. What Legislative Changes are Necessary

We look forward to hearing your views on this.

1. Overview

The commitment on page 95 of the Programme for Government is to:

“Develop inclusive and age-appropriate RSE and SPHE curricula across primary and post-primary levels, including an inclusive programme on LGBTI+ relationships and making appropriate legislative changes, if necessary.”

On 29 April 2021, Tanaiste Leo Varadkar, responding to a question from Roisin Shortall, told the Dail:

“The programme for Government is explicit on this and states that the Government will develop inclusive and age-appropriate curricula for RSE and social, personal and health education, SPHE, across primary and post-primary schools, including an inclusive programme on LGBTI+ relationships. That is the Government’s policy and position, and it is what we expect to be upheld in publicly funded schools.

As things stand, all schools have to have an RSE policy and that has to be developed in consultation with school management, parents, teachers and students, as appropriate. A school’s programme for RSE is developed and taught in the context of the school’s RSE policy. The ethos of the school should never preclude learners from acquiring knowledge about the issues involved, but may influence how the content is treated.”

The first paragraph of the Tanaiste’s statement outlines the Government’s commitment as described in the Programme for Government, although it omits the part about “making appropriate legislative changes, if necessary.”

The second paragraph (which begins with “As things stand…”) outlines the current position in schools, which includes that the ethos of the school should not influence the content of the course, “but may influence how the content is treated.”

The current position (“As things stand…”) in the second paragraph does not allow the Government’s commitment in the first paragraph to be implemented. If school ethos can influence how the content is treated, then children will not get inclusive sex education.

That is why the legislative changes are necessary. This was already the case, but it is even more clear in light of the publication of the Flourish RSE course by the Catholic Bishops.

2. The Current Position

The current position that the Tanaiste describes (“As things stand…”) is the policy of the Department of Education, as reflected in the following.

Section 9(d) of the Education Act states that:

“9. A recognised school … shall use its available resources to (d) promote the moral, spiritual, social and personal development of students and provide health education for them, in consultation with their parents, having regard to the characteristic spirit of the school.”

The purpose of Circular Letter 0037/2010 issued by the Department of Education in 2010 was to remind schools to develop a school policy in regard to RSE. The Circular quotes Section 9(d) though it inaccurately refers to it as Section 9(e). It also states that:

“2.2 The RSE policy should reflect the core values and ethos of the school as outlined in the school’s mission statement. Spiritual, moral and ethical issues may arise when teaching RSE. The school’s RSE policy should guide teachers in the treatment of such issues, in accordance with the ethos of the school.”

The Department of Education Resource Materials for Relationship and Sexuality Education 1998 states that: Read more…