Blaming Catholic schools for anti-Catholic bigotry and sectarianism in Scotland amounts to abhorrent victim-blaming when Catholics are often the main victims of such attitudes.
That’s according to Barbara Coupar, director of the Scottish Catholic Education Service, who says it is time to fight back against the accusation.
Writing in the Scottish Catholic Observer, she said the statement that Catholic schools cause sectarianism is suggesting that “teachers are educating towards a culture of prejudice and our children are bigots”. Addressing parents she said, “What is being said is that by choosing to send your child to a Catholic school, you are the cause of the centuries of hate crimes in Scotland and you are part of the problem.”
She added that this, along with attacks on other fronts against Catholic schools, reveal a wider agenda: “a removal of faith from the public square and a society where rights, respect and tolerance are afforded to everyone, except people of faith.”
Drawing a parallel with the #metoo campaign, she lamented that the Catholic community must “respond to the allegation that it is our ‘fault’ that sectarianism, a crime most notably committed against Catholics, is caused because we won’t just ‘assimilate’ into Scottish culture and accept a secular education imposed us”.
