The duty of the State to provide Catholic schools "is paramount", Catholic primate and Archbishop of Armagh Seán Brady has said. There was also "no such thing as a neutral view of education and the values inherent in it," he added.
Dr Brady was speaking in Ballina, Co Mayo, last night at the official launch of celebrations marking the centenary of St Muredach's College.
"The State should keep in mind the principle of subsidiarity so that no kind of school monopoly rises. For such a monopoly would militate against the native rights of the human person, the development and spread of culture itself, the peaceful association of citizens, and the pluralism which exists today in very many societies," he continued.
"Parents have the right to choose the kind of education they want for their children and to choose a school that corresponds to their own convictions, subject to standards of viability.
Public authorities must guarantee this parental right. There are parents who wish to send their children to Catholic schools and accordingly the duty of the State to provide such schools is paramount," he said.
He added that "if there is one popular myth about education which needs to be challenged it is the assumption that to remove religion and religious ethos from schools is to make our schools somehow neutral and therefore acceptable to all.
"This is simply not true.There is no such thing as a neutral view of education and the values inherent in it," he said.
It was not true to say " the only appropriate way for a diverse pluralist society to deal with religion in schools is by presenting all world religions without any in-depth formation in one particular tradition," he said.
