The Irish Constitution requires the President to take a religious oath in order to take office. In a recent interview with BBC Radio Ulster the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins said that, in a new Ireland, “one should just affirm” (that is, make a...
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...
Census figures released today show yet again that Ireland is no longer a Catholic country. Our laws must catch up with this reality, and stop giving privilege to the Catholic Church. For the first time ever, in 2020, there were more Civil marriages than Catholic...
Atheist Ireland has been working for several years on the issue of objective versus Catholic sex education in Irish schools. If you want to understand more about the issue, you can read our submissions and articles linked below. The Department of Education supports the integration...
As the NCCA is updating the syllabus for Social, Personal, and Health Education (SPHE), the Catholic Bishops are circling the croziers by introducing a new course called ‘Flourish’ in publicly funded national schools. Flourish is officially Relationship and Sex Education, and in practice is Catholic...
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...
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...
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,...
Over the past fifty years, the Irish education system has evolved to include religious discrimination that was not intended to be there. The influence of the Catholic Church has undermined attempts by politicians to respect and balance the Constitutional rights of all families. Please lobby...
The Oireachtas Joint Committee on Local Government is discussing the Electoral Reform Bill 2020. Atheist Ireland has written to the Committee, asking them to protect our democracy from the undue influence of money between elections. Dear Committee Member, We note that your Committee met on...