Religious discrimination in the Irish Defence Forces Part 2
Last month Atheist Ireland, the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, and the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Ireland, made a joint submission to the Public Consultation Commission on the Defence Forces. You can read that here. We argued that Roman Catholicism is part of the culture of the Defence Forces, and that ...
Atheist Ireland, Evangelical Alliance, and Ahmadiyya Muslims ask UN to strengthen secularism in Ireland
Ireland will be questioned this year by the United Nations Human Rights Council under a process called the Universal Periodic Review. Atheist Ireland, the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, and the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Ireland, have made this joint submission to UN on freedom of religion and belief in Ireland. ...
Religious discrimination in the Irish Defence Forces Part 1
Atheist Ireland, the Evangelical Alliance of Ireland, and the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Ireland, have made the following joint submission to the Public Consultation Commission on the Defence Forces. 1. Introduction 2. Overview 3. Population Demographics 4. Catholic Culture in the Defence Forces 5. What the Defence Forces Website says 6. What ...
Vatican’s anti-gay-union dogma is part of the ethos of Irish schools
The Vatican has repeated its policy that it will not bless same sex unions. This should not be a surprise for anybody who is following the changing demographics of the Catholic Church, and the leadership of the theologically conservative Pope Francis, who started his papacy by endorsing an organisation of ...
The Human Right to be Atheist and Secular
There is an established internationally recognised human right to be atheist, agnostic, secular, humanist, or in any other way free from religion. This human right is part of the fundamental right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion or belief. It applies equally to all persons, including persons with non-theistic and ...
Dying with Dignity Bill – Atheist Ireland submission to Justice Committee
The Oireachtas Justice Committee is scrutinising the Dying with Dignity Bill 2020. This is a submission from Atheist Ireland responding to questions raised by the Committee. Define the problem/the policy issue which the Bill is designed to address; to what extent is it an issue requiring attention? The Bill has ...
RTE’s ‘blasphemous’ comedy sketch – opinions of an atheist and a Catholic priest
This article is written by Peter Hinchliffe, who runs the Atheist Ireland Kerry Group. A few weeks ago a local paper asked if I could submit responses to questions raised by the issue of RTEs sketch showing the Abrahamic god being arrested for the rape of Mary. The Paper had also ...
How the Irish Catholic Church has harmed our people, our schools, and our democracy
In the aftermath of the Mother and Baby Homes report, Seamus McKenna outlines how the Irish Catholic Church has harmed our people, our schools, and our democracy. On the 12th of January 2021 the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes and certain related matters in the Republic of ...
Religious oaths in the Irish Constitution
In Ireland atheists, humanists and the non-religious cannot take high office because of the requirement to take a religious oath in our Constitution. Atheist Ireland runs a ‘One Oath For All’ campaign, to enable conscientious atheists to hold the office of President, Judge, Taoiseach, or other members of the Council ...
Forcing respect for 160+ beliefs is impractical, and undermines freedom of expression
The right to freedom of conscience, religion and belief is one of the foundations of a democratic society. We have listed in this article over 150 religions that are recognised in Ireland, and ten nonreligious philosophical convictions that Human Rights law gives the same status as religious beliefs. Many people, ...