Atheist Ireland has learned that the Department of Education and Skills is to issue new guidelines on the teaching of religion at post-primary level. This follows an engagement between a parent who is a member of Atheist Ireland and the ETB sector, with regard to...
Fintan O’Toole writes today in the Irish Times about how the word ‘ethos’ is used in Irish schools to justify imposing arbitrary rules, based on the personal religious beliefs of those in authority. He points out that in the 1882 Eileen Flynn case, the school...
An Irish nun was excommunicated after she sanctioned an abortion to save a woman’s life in a Catholic hospital in Arizona in 2009. She was later allowed to return to the Church if she went to confession and resigned her position in the hospital. The...
The Irish State is planning to give a €300 million National Maternity Hospital to the Sisters of Charity. The Minister for Health has said that “only doctors and other healthcare professionals would make decisions about women’s health in the planned new Hospital.” However, the Sisters...
Much of the commentary about the new National Maternity Hospital has focussed on money. It is of course outrageous that the State would gift a brand new hospital, worth hundred of millions of euro, to a religious order which still owes millions of euro to...
Atheist Ireland joins the March for Science. Atheist Ireland is proud to join the Irish Cancer Society, Irish Society for Immunology, Trinity College Dublin Student Union, Cool Planet Experience, Star Trek Éire, Irish Federation of University Teachers and International Consortium of Research Associations as partners...
In the context of the ongoing controversy about the new National Maternity Hospital being given to a religious order, it is instructive to look at what it means for State-funded public services to be run by private faith-based organisations. The Mater Hospital is run by...
The Ceann Comhairle of the Dail, Sean O Fearghail TD, has replied to Atheist Ireland’s letter about the Dail prayer. He has confirmed that the proposal that was scheduled for Tuesday will now instead be put to the house on its return after the Easter...
Update: following lobbying from Atheist Ireland and opposition from secular TDs, the Dail business committee decided today to postpone this vote until 2nd May, in order to allow time for debate. Please continue to contact your TDs about this between now and then. At 2.30...
Atheist Ireland held a successful campaign encouraging people with no religion to say so in the census. We welcome the following preliminary results from the census: One in ten Irish people (468,400) have no religion. That’s a 73% rise from 2011, which is the highest...