THE Catholic Hierarchy has warmly welcomed plans to teach religion as an exam subject for the first time in the history of the State.
At their spring meeting in Maynooth, which ended yesterday, the bishops said there had been "a wide welcome across the community for the initiative of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) in drafting religious education syllabi for Junior and Leaving Certificate".
The Hierarchy's spokesman, Bishop Thomas Flynn, said he was "very, very happy" with the syllabi. The subject will be optional, and students can choose between two core areas: World Religions or The Origins of Christianity.
"In addition to giving the students information and developing them as whole persons, the proposed syllabi will help to foster understanding between the churches," he said.
Bishop Flynn said the bishops were encouraged by the experience in Northern Ireland, where religion is one of the most popular subjects after English and maths.
In contrast, in the Republic "there has been so much pressure to spend time on subjects that will be examined, there has been a tendency to push religion aside". However, he stressed that catechists in Catholic secondary schools were doing "tremendous work in difficult circumstances".
Father Dermot Lane, the Catholic Church's representative on the NCCA, said it was his understanding that the Minister for Education, Ms Breathnach, was committed to abolishing the 1878 Act of Parliament which prohibited the payment of examiners in religion. This law was an obstacle to the teaching of religion as an exam subject.
He did not see religion under the proposed syllabi being taught as "a mishmash of everything and anything" because "each school would teach it according to its own particular ethos".
Thus Buddhism, Hinduism and other non Christian religions would be given "open and sympathetic treatment", but would not be taught as being of equal value to Christianity because of the spiritual, historical and cultural importance of Christianity here.
He said it was up to each school to decide whether to devote all its resources to teaching religion as an exam subject, to continue teaching catechetics as before, or to mix the two. He said it would be two years at least before teaching would begin on the new syllabi, to allow for final consultations, and training of teachers.
Bishop Flynn also said the bishops had asked their advisory committee on child sex abuse to select a "resource group" from among its members to devise and implement training programmes for the people being appointed at diocesan level to deal with future allegations against priests and religious.
Noting that long term unemployment had remained static since they issued their 1992 pastoral letter, Work is the Key, Bishop Flynn said the Bishops' Council for Social Welfare would be publishing a booklet next week based on workshops held with unemployed people.