Sir, – I agree with Eoin Daly ("Treatment of non-Catholics urgent human rights issue", Education, May 13th) that the treatment of non-Catholic parents and children is an urgent human rights issue.
I and my children have direct experience of what I believe is discrimination against us as non-Catholics.
Our children were “lucky” as non-Catholics to get a place in our local school, as it is a Catholic ethos school. We were told that had there been any pressure on numbers applying to the school, our first child would have not received a place there. This is despite the fact that we live in a rural area and the nearest alternative non-Catholic school was a further seven miles away.
We would have been subjected to unwarranted longer commutes and simple things like a school bus would not have been a possibility. We were further told that under no circumstances could our children be excluded from religion class as there was no facility for that.
This meant that for the eight years of primary school, our children received a religious education that was in direct conflict with our family’s beliefs.
The focus on divestment is all very well but will in no way help non-Catholic families in rural areas who will not have access to alternative schools for the most part.
I also think it’s a terrible pity that religious and non-religious as a rule cannot be educated together.
We should have more communication between groups and this should start from a young age. I believe that in Educate Together schools parents who wish their children to have religious sacraments can do so but are prepared outside school time. Could this not be a model for all State schools, with some hours set aside for religious preparation but still letting children in general be educated together?
I believe that the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Education and the Department of Education have failed our non-Catholic children by not addressing this issue in a comprehensive manner. – Yours, etc,
EMMA SMITH,
Hollywood,
Co Wicklow.