A MOTION calling for the safeguarding of religious education in
Church of Ireland schools in the Republic was passed at the Synod.
The motion, in the names of Dr Anne Lodge (Dublin)
and the Archdeacon of Cork, Cloyne & Ross, the
Ven. Adrian Wilkinson (Cork), called on the General Synod to affirm
the importance of religious education in primary schools under
Church of Ireland patronage, and on the Board of Education, to
ensure that high-quality standards were maintained in the delivery
of the "Follow Me" Religious Education curriculum.
Dr Lodge said that it was the Church of Ireland rather than the
State which decided the content of religious education in Church of
Ireland schools. She explained that Follow Me was carefully
constructed to be inclusive of children of the various reformed
Christian Churches, and to be age-appropriate both in its content
and in its approaches to teaching.
Seconding the motion, Archdeacon Wilkinson said that, in primary
school, religious education took place in the classroom, and was
where "what is implicit in the ethos of our schools becomes
explicit". He said, however, that the Department of Education had
no part to play in religious education or its evaluation. He said
that the motion requested that the Board of Education ensure that
high standards were maintained in the delivery of the Follow Me
programme.
A motion calling for equal treatment of all schools in Northern
Ireland was also passed. The motion, in the names of the
Bishop of Derry & Raphoe, the Rt Revd Kenneth Good,
and Dr Kenneth Dunn (Connor), stated that the
General Synod noted with deep concern the continued disadvantaged
position of controlled schools throughout Northern Ireland, owing
to a lack of a dedicated advocacy-and-support body, and called on
the Minister of Education to take steps to resolve this injustice,
and ensure equality of treatment for all schools.
Proposing the motion, Bishop Good said that other sectors of
schools in Northern Ireland - including the Catholic Maintained
sector, the Integrated sector, and the Irish Medium sector - each
had a dedicated support body. The controlled sector, made up of
church schools that the C of I, the Presbyterian, and the Methodist
Churches transferred to the control of the State in the the 20th
century, did not.
A further motion called on the General Synod to encourage the
board of governors of the Church of Ireland College of Education to
ensure that in ongoing discussions regarding any reconfiguration of
the college - due to take place in a merger involving Dublin City
University and other teacher-training colleges - the religious
ethos and values of the Church of Ireland, as outlined in the
resolution adopted by the General Synod in 2013, are promoted and
legally safeguarded.