Dr Stephen Bullivant of St Mary’s University in London analyses the religion results from Census 2016 and finds an Ireland where religious affiliation is falling but is still very high by European standards. You can view his presentation here. He addressed the topic at a meetings of The Iona Institute held on August 24, 2017....
The most horrific surrogacy case is making its way to the US Supreme Court. It is a perfect storm of practically all of the terrible ethical violations that bedevil the practice, even when it is non-commercial. Health Minister, Simon Harris (pictured), should study the case carefully as he prepares legislation to regulate the whole area...
Under the Irish tax code, a married couple on one income can pay thousands more in tax each year compared with a double-income married couple earning the same amount. For example, a single-income married couple on €65,600 per annum, will pay more than €12,000 in tax while a double-income married couple also earning €65,600 will...
Irish Times Religious Affairs Correspondent, Patsy McGarry, wrote an article last week urging the broadest use of the new techniques available in genome editing that aim to decrease the likelihood of children being born with serious genetic defects. The problem with this process is that it involves a form of experimentation on embryos which destroys...
Paul Cullen recently wrote a long article for the Irish Times about the rights of children conceived artificially through the use of sperm or eggs from anonymous donors. This controversial method, called heterologous fertilisation, raises many moral and legal issues. To what extent does this practice infringe the identity rights of these ‘donor-children’? The Assisted...
New Census data shows that the married family continues its decline in Irish life. While it is still by the easily the predominant type of family overall, its dominance has declined with the rise of cohabiting couples, divorce and separation, and single-parent households. Yesterday, the CSO released the Households and Family data from Census 2016....
Iona Institute director, David Quinn, was on The Pat Kenny Show last week to discuss the proposal by Education Minister, Richard Bruton, to remove the right of Catholic schools to admit Catholic children first in the event of over-enrollment. This right is being removed only from Catholic schools. The right of minority faith schools and...
The recent ruling by the Supreme Court on a polygamous marriage means that exclusivity is no longer considered an essential element in marriage. So, marriage does not have to be exclusive under the new legal dispensation, it does not have to be the conjugal union of a man and a woman, it cannot be legally...
Neither the Church nor the State should determine what kinds of schools we have. This is up to parents. The State must support the wishes of parents, including the wishes of parents who want faith schools and those who don’t. Read more in our paper ‘The Liberal Case for Religious Schools’.
Regular international surveys of student performance have become a feature of the world of education in recent years. The two best-known such surveys are TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study – run by the IEA) and PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment – run by the OECD). The former measures the performance of...
