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2011

  • Clergyman’s civil partnership

It was revealed in the Irish media that a serving Church of Ireland (Anglican) clergyman had entered into a same-sex civil partnership. The clergyman, the Reverend Tom Gordon, Dean of Leighlin Cathedral was supported by his Bishop but criticised by some conservative evangelicals in the denomination. In response the Church of Ireland, which is the state’s largest Protestant denomination, has announced a special conference for church members to discuss the subject of human sexuality in spring 2012. The Irish government made provision for civil partnerships earlier this year.

  • April 2011: Role of Religious Denominations in School Governance and Religious Education

The future denominational profile of schools and religious education are live public policy issues in Ireland today, particularly in relation to primary schooling. The coming together of a number of factors have contributed to this: increasing religious diversity arising from immigration; the decline of religious personnel as teachers and school principals; dis-identification with Catholic belief and practice among devotees; perceived absence of parental choice concerning the type of school their child can attend.

In April 2011 the Irish government established the Forum on Patronage and Pluralism in the Primary Sector to consider proposals for dealing with the management and teaching of religion in Irish primary schools against the background of an increasingly pluralistic society. The forum’s report was published in 2012 and recommended a range of measures aimed at balancing the need to preserve the denominational Catholic sector while at the same time meeting the religious education and school governance needs of children and parents who do not belong to a religious denomination or who belong to a minority religious denomination. The report has been generally well received.

D 22 September 2011   

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