The State must respect the rights of parents to choose to send their children to Catholic secondary schools, the president of the Association of Management of Catholic Secondary Schools (AMCSS/JMB) has said. Mr Noel Merrick told delegates at the organisation’s annual conference in Killarney this week that the State need to play its part in...
Grandparents in the UK are to be given legal rights to enable them to have access to their grandchildren after divorce battles under new proposals. According to a report in the Daily Telegraph, the plan will mean that, for the first time, parents who separate will be expected to ensure grandparents continue to have a...
A group promoting ‘polyamory’, whereby people are in a sexual relationship with more than one person and all parties to the relationship know this has been set up in Ireland. The group, Polyamory Ireland, has set up a website which describes itself as “an informal discussion/support group for anyone interested in creative, respectful, loving, inclusive...
Church leaders are believed to be concerned at plans announced yesterday by Education Minister Ruairi Quinn to transfer up to 50 per cent of its primary schools to other patrons. According to The Irish Independent, sources close to the Catholic bishops say that the Minister’s target of beginning to transfer schools next January was too...
Minister for Children Frances Fitzgerald has said she hopes a children’s referendum will be held before the end of the year. Speaking at the launch of the new National Children’s Strategy, Minister Fitzgerald said the Government will decide soon on the wording and clarification of the referendum. The Minister said she needed to examine the...
Lawyers representing parents in Germany currently in jail for refusing to send their children to compulsory sex education classes, have sent letters to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) asking them to review appeals filed last year speedily. One of the fathers is currently serving his second prison term. The lawyers, who are being...
Aggressive secularists are undermining the UK’s Christian values, a leading Anglican bishop has warned. Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali warned that Britain was no longer a free society, and argued that “encroaching totalitarianism” was threatening respect for conscience. Speaking at the Christian Broadcasting Council’s annual conference the former Bishop of Rochester also lamented that respect for human...
A French history and geography teacher has been suspended for showing his students a video that includes footage of real late-term abortions performed at a Spanish facility. The teacher had also provided material arguing in favour of abortion. Mr Philippe Isnard, a civics instructor at Iscles High School in the city of Manosque, was suspended...
A US federal appeals court has refused to allow same-sex marriages to take place in California while it considers the constitutionality of Proposition 8, an amendment to the state’s constitution which held that marriage can only be between a man and a woman. California has Civil Partnerships. Proposition 8 was carried by a margin of...
The Ombudsman for Children, Emily Logan (pictured), has called on the Government to hold the proposed childrens’ rights referendum as soon as possible. In a submission to the UN Human Rights’ Council, to which Ireland will report in October, she said that the Government “should proceed at the earliest opportunity to hold a constitutional referendum...
