to not baptise my children?

[leafbarktree]

I live in Rep of Ireland, and have two small pre-schoolers, neither are baptised. DH and I were both raised Catholic and are non the worse for wear as a result, but both of us are now at best agnostic, and would disagree with the church on several aspects of their teaching.

In Ireland, the vast majority of schools have the Catholic church as 'patron', and are free to prioritise Catholic children over those of other faith or none. (schools with other patrons have the same right). All of our local schools are over-subscribed and the kids will not currently get in to any of them, unless we baptise them. There are a few non-denominational schools a bit further away, but again they are over subscribed, and the chances of getting in are slim-to-none.

The department of education has said that every child will be offered a place, but I know anecdotally the school that we would be offered. It's no where near us and doesn't have a great reputation on any score. Additionally, it's not a 'feeder' for any good secondary school, so we would be snookered further down the line again.

I am worried that we are hanging our children's education out to dry for the sake of our own principles. Should we just baptise the kids, get the piece of paper and get on with it? I am very aware that if everyone in Ireland keeps doing this, nothing will change.

TakeMeUp, how old are you? Because I'm 42 and had a religious education courtesy of the Presentation nuns that didn't different in many respects from that of my mother, who was born in 1946.

Disproportionate amounts of school time given up to religion - several months of FHC and confirmation years dedicated almost entirely to preparation - prayers at beginning and end of school and often at start of individual classes in secondary, retired nuns back from the 'missions' doing their bit to flog us missionary magazines, and taking up collections 'for the black babies'. I was brought in and lectured to by the head nun because I didn't take the pioneer temperance pledge at the confirmation ceremony.

Zero sex education, unless you count a half hour about periods from a Good a Shepherd nun in sixth class and an hour in fifth year which featured a film of a birth that looked like something from a horror film and colour photographs of aborted foetuses. Abortion and divorce regarded as the ultimate social ills and prepared as conversation topics for Irish and French oral exams.

One nun who was briefly at my primary school was brilliant, feminist and forward-thinking, but others shouldn't have been allowed near young children. One had regular breakdowns and an apocalyptic cast of mind and had us out in the corridor with our hands on our heads terrifying us with the secrets of Fatima and the end of the world, which she thought was imminent. One told us in senior infants (aged 5/6) there was no Santa, and we'd be better off thinking less about presents and more about the baby Jesus, and said we would only go to heaven if we died in our sleep if we slept with our hands crossed on our chests.

More girls dropped out pregnant in fifth year and Leaving Cert than went to university. Four years after I left, a friend of a friend who was doing her HDip at my old school was brought in by then lay Head and cautioned for parking her car in the school carpark with a child's car seat in it, because, as an 'unmarried mother' she was a bad example to the girls. This would have been in 1994.

None of which is relevant to a child starting school now, but my school experience in the 70s and 80s can't have been that anomalous.

no need to get defensive Mitzy, it was a genuine question and I am interested to read your answers. Do you think that the 10 per cent of non Catholic schools is sufficient for all the non Catholics in the republic? or would some of them be forced into Catholic teachings through lack of school choice?

Hakluyt/TTWK - no one is disputing this. I was disputing the argument that you can't have a Jewish child. What should I do with mine? feed them pork every other day until they are old enough to decide to keep kosher? Perhaps avoid beef in case they want to be hindus, or maybe let them watch telly on Saturdays until they decide otherwise.

I think defining 'non Catholic' is an issue in itself, as this thread proves, Duncan. 90 something percent of the population still baptises its children as Catholics. Only a small and rapidly shrinking percentage of those (boosted by immigrants from Poland and the Philippines etc) are practising/believing Catholics.

I grew up less than a quarter of a mile from a highly-regarded Church of Ireland secondary school which was undersubscribed and thus took in children if other faiths or none. It still never occurred to my parents to send their clever daughter who had skipped two years of primary school 'to the Protestants', so they sent me to the local convent school, which was notorious for poor results, mitching and pregnancies.

Duncan due respect, have your RTFT? I think if you do you will quite clearly see that 10% of schools not being controlled by the Catholic Church is wholly insufficient.

The % is of the population who practise as Catholics is WAY less than that. Baptised or not. There is not one young family in Dublin of my acquaintance who are regular mass attenders. Not one. And I don't know one family where all the children are not baptised - in the main so that they can get into schools.

If it's going to be a catholic school either way, then I can't say I'd blame you for baptising to get into the one that is better & closer.

I think it's a roller coaster that you'll find difficult to get off though. Is there absolutely no other options, even moving, that you could consider? Personally, I would rather home school than send my child to catholic school but I don't share your religious upbringing.

If as you say you've 'grown up unscathed' by some of the more dubious (imho) catholic teachings you are probably better placed than many to ensure your DC's get a more balanced view of life at home.

I wasn't being defensive I was just explaining why the conversation revolves around Catholicism.

96% of Irish primary schools in total are under religious patronage, the other 6% being primarily CoI. I don't think 4% of schools being non denom is anywhere near enough. The massive over subscription to these schools is evidence of this.

samG76, they are your kids and you must bring them up accordingly. When I was a kid my parents wouldn't have South African fruit in the house, because they were anti apartheid. I had to live without Cape apples, but they never would have labelled me as being anti apartheid. Not when I was 3!!! I made that decision myself at about 9 or 10, when I was old enough to understand. No doubt I was influenced by them. Having said that, they were unorthodox Jewish and I'm an atheist, so I didn't follow everything they thought.

You are entitled to keep a Kosher house, and they will have to live with that. because they are the kids of Jewish parents.

That's my take on it anyway.

I haven't had my DC baptised, despite a lot of pressure from family. Every school bar one in my town/neighbouring towns are either CofE or Catholic, so this puts them at a disadvantage when applying for school places. Fortunately my son did get in to the non affiliated school, which was the one we wanted for him anyway, but we did consider getting him christened CofE in case he didn't in, as our second and third choices were CofE schools. We decided against it in the end as it just felt hypocritical. my younger DS will have automatic sibling priority at the preferred school, so it's not such an issue with him.

I'm not in Ireland though, which makes a massive difference! In your position, I think I would just get it done. But I guess if everyone does this, it never resolves the issue of a lack of non faith schools, does it?

There is also a distinct lack of non denominational school in large areas of the UK. Especially if you aren't in a big city. As I aid before, in my city (really a big market town) there is ONE school within about 40 miles that is a 'community primary' school and not CofE or Catholic. Oh, there's one Steiner school, which I would never consider sending my children to. Secondary schools are a little better, there are two non faith secondaries but one is a Grammar school and the other is closing down due to its poor results next year!

Hi all, thanks for some great suggestions. Just googled the gaelscoileanna website, there's one nearby but I know from conversations with other mums that, yet again, it's oversubscribed and they have taken to interviewing the parents As Gaeilge, and turning down parents who don't pass muster... We would definitely fail!! There are a few a bit further away which I'll check out, but TBH neither of us are into the Irish language and would rather the kids be educated As Bearla if possible Checked the community schools website but none in this neck of the woods yet (bit confused about this outfit, they seem like ET all over again?)

I have rung the ET school and DD1's name is way down the list. There is a chance she could get in but it doesn't look great.

Duncan- just to be equitable- I have also stuck their names down in the local COI school but they have the same enrollement policy and are (you've guessed it) oversubscribed.

I think we will probably stick it out for another year and see if we get a spot somewhere or other, but if push comes to shove and we're out of options, I suspect we will cave in

"But I guess if everyone does this, it never resolves the issue of a lack of non faith schools, does it?"

Exactly. And the fewer "baptisms of convenience" there are, the fairer the admissions will be for everyone.

Incidentally, the school DS1 is in is the one that everyone told me he wouldn't get into because he's not baptized, "not a chance", "just do it", etc. - I'm sure it's not a done deal that your child definitely won't get into the school of your choice without baptism. In our case the school added an extra Junior Infants class the year he applied.

leafbark not to make it worse, but there are a number of schools here where if you haven't been baptised in the first 6 months of life, you don't qualify. I know a number of Dioceses have been clamping down on that as an unfair practice, but it might be worth checking if the same nonsense is being applied near you.

I would have LOVED to have been educated as Gaelige as my parents have barely the cupla focal between them. We'd have got away with murder

Diarmuid Martin wants to release some of the schools. I wish they'd bloody get on with it!

TTWK - if they were non-orthodox and you are atheist, it doesn't sound as if there's much you and your parents disagree on. In your view, when does a person get to call themselves Jewish, and what would they have to believe to do so, bearing in mind of course that Judaism isn't really a religion?

TTWK - sorry - pressed post too early - I meant Judaism is not a belief-centered religion.

samG76, They believed in god, and I don't, so I would guess that's a pretty big difference when it comes to religion.

No idea what constitutes Jewishness; playing cards all night, eating chicken soup and driving a Volvo seemed to be the main criteria when I grew up.

I love the phrase I often hear, when someone says they are half Jewish. I always say "make up your mind, are you waiting for the messiah or aren't you?"

It is terrible that you even have to consider baptising children for school places. I live in the Rep of Ireland and my 4 children are not baptised. Our local national catholic school is so small they were very glad to have us. under 15 pupils in total so now a high percentage of non baptised pupils !

"My view is that primary age children are so immensely suggestible and trusting of what they're told in school that it can be impossible very difficult to unpick the immersive religious instruction of a Catholic education by saying something different at home. By secondary, they might have the critical thinking faculties to question what they're taught, but in primary, I think they're too vulnerable to absorbing unquestioning belief. Having seen this in action first-hand in more than one Catholic primary school, I don't want to place my DS in that situation. "

I don't think so. Me and my husband went to Catholic school. His parents believed and were church goers, mine never pushed it and it was very laissez faire. Neither of us practise or believe. My kids are baptised but we don't practise or go to mass, I never told them I was an atheist. I actually told them about God and read them the Christmas story etc to see if they were interested. Both came to the conclusion they are atheists. I think this is very common these days, especially if the parents and forcing it at home.

"parents AREN'T forcing it at home"

Bambamini - are your dc in a full-on Catholic primary school that fully immerses all aspects of school life jn Catholicism? (I listed some examples of this immersion in a pp).

My point is that such schools are the ones where it's very difficult for a child not to absorb some of the belief system, regardless of what parents discuss at home.

If neither the school nor the parents push religion, then a child may develop no particular convictions. But if one side or the other presents a particular religion as The Truth, then a young child can't be expected to withstand the indoctrination.

My children go to a non denominational school. But, my husband and I and many others I know did go to catholic schools and took it with a pinch of salt and many of us made our own minds up against it.

Same here, I made up my own mind against it as well, but my head (plus those of nephews/nieces in recent times) was still filled with all sorts of indoctrination as a child in a Catholic primary school. And it wasn't a straightforward process to deprogramme either - years after I stopped believing in anything, I would still find myself automatically judging situations in particular (narrow) ways because that culture was so ingrained after years in a Catholic school environment.

I just don't want my DS to go through that.

State education should be entirely secular and non-denominational...

I'm in the same position as you, and I will not be baptising my children. However, if they are denied a place in the state-funded school (down the road) that I'm planning on sending them to, I am ready to fight a legal battle about it.

It's absolutely ridiculous the number of people on the first page of this post alone who are saying "Just do it.". Go on - sacrifice your ideals. Your commitment to not bowing to the pressure of joining the Catholic Church in this backward parochial little country can't possibly be as strong as people's commitment to an "actual" religion. What can it hurt? Only everyone who's ever been hurt be the scarily strong hold the Catholic Church has had on our country for many years.

If people like us don't start the process of change and fight for it, things will not change.

To quote another good Irishman: "I fear more than that the chemical action which would be set up in my soul by a false homage to a symbol behind which are massed twenty centuries of authority and veneration."
(James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.)