Tinsel-crowned angels and tiny children in tea towel head coverings adorably forgetting their one line seem to be the first thing people think about when faith-based schools’ approach to religious education is questioned.
The UK Supreme Court found that religious education and collective worship in certain schools in Northern Ireland are in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights because they are not conveyed in an “objective, critical and pluralistic manner”.
Minister for Education Paul Givan rushed to assure people that nativity plays would still happen.
In 2019, when a change of patronage of one of the eight Catholic schools in the Portmarnock, Malahide and Kinsealy areas was mooted, people also worried about the nativity play. None of the eight schools changed patronage. Parents valued the school they had, especially when they did not fully know what the change would entail.
Ireland’s graduates: ‘Everyone I know is thinking of moving abroad or has gone’
‘Regift the bejaysus out of it’: 21 tips for a cheaper Christmas, from readers and from us
‘Huge demand’ for Irish language classes as adult learners return to school decades on
‘It was utterly sacred’: Manchán Magan’s widow on his final days, death and legacy
Today, freedom of religion is mostly construed as freedom from religion, but it also encompasses the right to practise a religion and to educate your children in it.
The Northern Irish case involved parents who do not profess any religious belief. They were naturally unhappy when their small daughter began to say grace before meals and to believe that God made the world. They opted not to withdraw her from RE for fear that she might be bullied or stigmatised, as the only child being withdrawn in a school of 250-275 children. The Supreme Court stated that the judgment is not about secularising education, and acknowledged that “historically and today, Christianity is the most important religion in Northern Ireland”.
In 1921, after Partition, the Church of Ireland, the Presbyterian Church and the Methodist Church’s voluntary schools in Northern Ireland chose to transfer their assets to the State. They became known as controlled schools, while the Catholic Church maintained its voluntary status. Therefore, the judgment does not apply to Catholic schools, which are free to teach according to their beliefs.
Northern Ireland is changing rapidly. The Iona Institute (of which I am a patron) conducted a poll with Amárach Research this year in Northern Ireland, which found that 36 per cent of those surveyed did not belong to any religion, while 39 per cent say they are neither religious nor spiritual.
[ Idea that Irish schoolchildren can simply ‘opt out’ of religion class is a mythOpens in new window ]
Although there was an uptick in interest in religion among 18- to 24-year-olds, religion is no longer all-pervasive.
The Department of Education in this jurisdiction is surveying parents about the type of education and patronage they want for their children. As the primary educators, parents have a right to raise their children in accordance with their beliefs, but what about when there is no school that mirrors their beliefs?
The answer, some people say, is to teach about all major religions as a sociological phenomenon, in the way you might teach about ancient Roman gods.
Religion is seen as essentially a private activity to be parked outside the school door, unlike any other form of identity. However, there is no such thing as neutral education, much less a value-free way of engaging with religion. The idea that teaching about religion is more beneficial than teaching from within a religious perspective is in itself a worldview that is being chosen and imposed.
The way that the word “indoctrination” was used in the judgment will grate on all believers, despite the claim that its use was intended to be “devoid of all negative connotations”. However, indoctrination was defined as identical with “evangelism and proselytism”. No Christian from any tradition that I know would accept indoctrination as a synonym for evangelism. As Pope Leo put it bluntly, “Indoctrination is immoral. It stifles critical judgment and undermines the sacred freedom of respect for conscience.”
The Religious Freedom in the World Report for 2025, by Aid to the Church in Need, was launched in the European Parliament Liaison Office in Dublin recently and was mentioned in the Dáil.
Tánaiste Simon Harris, in response to Peadar Tóibín’s intervention on the shocking death toll due to religious persecution in Nigeria and Sudan, spontaneously commented that in Ireland, “what is sometimes called the progressive agenda” tries to exclude from conversation those “who want to send their children to a school of a religious ethos of their choice”.
[ A WhatsApp message about the secular ‘non-Communion’ makes my heart sinkOpens in new window ]
Although the biggest threat to religious freedom is authoritarianism, with countries such as China and Nicaragua subjecting their citizens to relentless surveillance and repressive legislation, there is also a kind of “polite persecution”, as pope Francis once dubbed it. Persecution may be too strong a term when compared with churches being burned, entire communities being forced to flee and a sharp rise, especially in anti-Semitic but also anti-Muslim crime – it might be better described as polite incomprehension and exclusion.
There are too many Catholic schools in Ireland, especially Catholic-in-name-only schools, but the answer is not a one-size-fits-all secularism. We need schools that can accommodate the little girl in this case, while also cherishing those who actually believe in what the nativity play embodies, as opposed to just cosplaying. Many existing faith-based schools in the Republic manage to do just that.
