An expert in Catholic education has warned against the Church in Ireland divesting its schools without first securing “cast-iron guarantees” on the issue of ethos for remaining institutions.
Speaking to The Irish Catholic newspaper, Dr Rik Van Nieuwenhove, lecturer in theology at Mary Immaculate College, Limerick, said the Church needed to fight the corner of those schools not involved in divestment.
“This is about negotiating and bargaining,” he insisted, “and I don’t think the Church should give up any schools without cast iron guarantees that the ethos of the stand-alone Catholic school will be safeguarded and maintained.”
He added that without such guarantees “we are going to end up with a sort of soft secularism in every school which is not desirable and does not contribute to a more pluralist Ireland”. It would be “naïve” to assume that divestment would automatically lead to a strengthening of ethos in schools remaining under Church patronage.
“I don’t think the remainder of the Catholic schools will become more Catholic as a consequence. It will not mean that they will be more Catholic. I don’t buy that at all,” he said.
Prof Eamonn Conway, head of Theology and Religious Studies at Mary Immaculate College, concurred with his colleague’s assessment, stating that Catholic ethos and identity “are not confined simply to the crosses on the walls for the 45 minutes of religious instruction. Catholic ethos and identity has to permeate the whole of the school day.”
