Content
1. Introduction
2. Recommendations
2.1. Issue statutory guidelines on respect for all beliefs
2.2. Ensure that school ethos cannot override children’s rights
2.3. Practical arrangements for children who do not attend religious instruction
2.4. Remove admissions discrimination on religious or ethos grounds
2.5. Provide non-denominational schools
2.6. Audit the wellbeing impact of school ethos
2.7. Include nonreligious families in consultation and monitoring
2.8. Inspect equality of belonging
3. Wellbeing requires real belonging, not merely welcoming language
4. The legal contradiction at the centre of school wellbeing
5. Admissions discrimination undermines belonging
6. The right to not attend religious instruction must be practical and stigma-free
7. The ethos of schools can shape the wellbeing curriculum itself
8. UN and Council of Europe recommendations
9. Conclusion
1. Introduction
Atheist Ireland welcomes the opportunity to make this submission to the Department of Education and Youth’s consultation on wellbeing in education.
The Department has stated that children and young people learn more effectively when they experience a sense of belonging in school, have confidence in themselves, and feel supported in their school communities. The Department’s review will inform the next Wellbeing in Education policy and implementation plan up to 2030 and beyond.
Atheist Ireland promotes an ethical, secular State that respects equally the human rights of atheists and secularists as well as those with religious beliefs. We work with religious minority groups, including Evangelical Christians and Ahmadi Muslims, on issues where the State privileges larger religions over smaller religions and non-religious philosophical beliefs.
This submission focuses on a structural problem that directly affects children’s wellbeing: many children are required, in practice, to attend publicly funded schools whose ethos (Characteristic Spirit – S.15.2 (b) Education Act 1998) does not reflect the beliefs of their families. Ireland has denominational, interdenominational, and multi-denominational schools, but no publicly funded non-denominational school sector.
All schools are registered with the Department as either denominational, multi-denominational, or inter-denominational. There is no access to an objective, critical and pluralistic education in any of these schools as per Article 2 of Protocol 1 of the European Convention or Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political rights.
This means that many atheist, secular, minority faith, and mixed-belief families have no realistic local alternative to a publicly funded school whose ethos reflects their family beliefs. That affects children’s sense of belonging, equality, identity, and emotional safety.
2. Recommendations
Atheist Ireland recommends that the Department of Education and Youth include the following commitments in the next Wellbeing in Education policy and implementation plan.
2.1. Issue statutory guidelines on respect for all beliefs
The Department should issue statutory guidelines giving practical effect to Section 15.2(e) of the Education Act 1998. These should explain how Boards of Management must respect and promote respect for the diversity of values, beliefs, traditions, languages and ways of life in society, including atheist, secular, minority religious, and mixed-belief families.
2.2. Ensure that school ethos cannot override children’s rights
The Department should make clear that no patron ethos may be interpreted or applied in a way that undermines a child’s rights to equality, freedom of conscience, freedom of religion or belief, privacy, dignity, and wellbeing.
2.3. Practical arrangements for children who do not attend religious instruction
The Department should introduce statutory guidelines that require all schools to provide meaningful, supervised, educational alternatives for children who do not attend religious instruction, education, worship, faith formation, sacramental preparation, or other ethos-specific activities that are against the conscience of children and their parents. These arrangements should be practical, resourced, stigma-free, and communicated clearly to parents. Section 62-7(n) of the Education Admissions to Schools Act 2018 has failed in its purpose to require schools to put the arrangements for not attending religious instruction in their Admission Policies.
2.4. Remove admissions discrimination on religious or ethos grounds
The Department should support legislative reform to remove religious and ethos-based discrimination in school admissions, as recommended by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child.
2.5. Provide non-denominational schools
The Department should develop a time-bound strategy, with adequate resources, to provide non-denominational schools. Multi-denominational schools are not the same as non-denominational schools. Multi-denominational means just that, multi-religious. Atheism and secularism are not denominations. Families should have access to schools where the State is neutral between religion and philosophical beliefs and where children have access to an objective, critical and pluralistic education.
2.6. Audit the wellbeing impact of school ethos
The Department should examine how a patron’s ethos affects the delivery of the Wellbeing curriculum, including SPHE, relationships and sexuality education, ethical understanding, identity, family, belonging, and citizenship.
2.7. Include nonreligious families in consultation and monitoring
The Department should explicitly include atheist, secular, minority faith, and mixed-belief families in consultation, focus groups, surveys, and monitoring of wellbeing policy.
2.8. Inspect equality of belonging
The Inspectorate should assess whether children from minority belief backgrounds experience equal belonging in school, including whether they are positively represented, whether their parents’ convictions are respected, and whether they suffer stigma and discrimination during religious instruction or ethos-based activities.
3. Wellbeing requires real belonging, not merely welcoming language
The primary Wellbeing Specification states that wellbeing is connected to children’s physical, social, relational, emotional and spiritual development, and that wellbeing includes a sense of purpose, connection, and belonging to a wider community. It also states that the specification promotes inclusive learning environments based on human rights and equality, recognises the diversity of cultures, identities, backgrounds and families in Irish classrooms, and says children should not be discriminated against on grounds including religion.
These are positive aims. However, they cannot be fully realised while the legal and policy framework of the Irish education system continues to allow publicly funded schools to integrate a patron’s ethos into the school environment and the state curriculum, while providing no effective Departmental guidance on how schools must respect the beliefs of children and parents who do not share that ethos.
Schools are not legally obliged to ensure access to children of an objective, critical and pluralistic education which is a General Principle of Article 2 of Protocol 1 of the European Convention and Article 18 of the ICCPR. A look at the Concluding Observations of the UN and Council of European over the years in relation to the Irish education system tells us how the system is failing to protect the human rights of all children.
A child does not feel fully included merely because a school says that everyone is welcome. A child feels included when the school’s practices, curriculum, ceremonies, relationships, policies, and daily language show that the child’s family beliefs are treated with equal respect.
For atheist and secular children, and for many minority religious children, the repeated message is often different. They may be told that they are welcome, but the school Admission policy, RSE Policy, ethos, prayers, religious instruction, religious symbols, sacramental preparation, patron programmes, and school ceremonies may all communicate that the school community has a “normal” belief identity from which they differ.
4. The legal contradiction at the centre of school wellbeing
Section 15 of the Education Act 1998 creates a tension that the Department has never properly resolved. On the one hand, a Board of Management must uphold, and is accountable to the patron for upholding, the characteristic spirit of the school as determined by the cultural, educational, moral, religious, social, linguistic, and spiritual values and traditions of that school. On the other hand, Section 15.2(e) requires Boards to have regard to the principles and requirements of a democratic society and to respect and promote respect for the diversity of values, beliefs, traditions, languages and ways of life in society.
In practice, the Department has issued no statutory guidelines explaining how Boards of Management should reconcile these duties where a child’s family beliefs conflict with the patron’s ethos.
This absence of guidance leaves schools, teachers, parents, and children in an unfair position. Boards of Management are required legally under Section 15-2(b) of the Education Act 1998 to uphold the ethos of the patron and to respect all beliefs (S.15-2(e)). But they are not told what that respect requires in daily school life. The European Court has defined ‘respect’ in its case law. It says that “respect means more than acknowledge or take into account.
The European court held as a General Principle that:
(c) Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 does not permit a distinction to be drawn between religious instruction and other subjects. It enjoins the State to respect parents’ convictions, be they religious or philosophical, throughout the entire State education programme (see Kjeldsen, Busk Madsen and Pedersen, cited above, p. 25, §51). That duty is broad in its extent as it applies not only to the content of education and the manner of its provision but also to the performance of all the “functions” assumed by the State.
The verb “respect” means more than “acknowledge” or “take into account”. In addition to a primarily negative undertaking, it implies some positive obligation on the part of the State. The term “conviction”, taken on its own, is not synonymous with the words “opinions” and “ideas”. It denotes views that attain a certain level of cogency, seriousness, cohesion and importance (see Valsamis, cited above, pp. 2323-24, §§ 25 and 27, and Campbell and Cosans, cited above, pp. 16-17, §§ 36-37).
The word ‘respect’ is a verb and involves all the functions assumed by the State. There is a positive obligation on behalf of the state to ‘respect’ parents’ convictions.
(2) Article 18 protects theistic, non-theistic and atheistic beliefs, as well as the right not to profess any religion or belief. The terms “belief” and “religion” are to be broadly construed. Article 18 is not limited in its application to traditional religions or to religions and beliefs with institutional characteristics or practices analogous to those of traditional religions. The Committee therefore views with concern any tendency to discriminate against any religion or belief for any reason, including the fact that they are newly established, or represent religious minorities that may be the subject of hostility on the part of a predominant religious community.
The only Guidelines for schools on these issues are from the Catholic Church. Successive Ministers have promoted these Catholic Guidelines as a basis for inclusion. However, these Guidelines state that atheism and humanism are not beliefs. This is contrary to human rights law and a reflection of what is wrong with the structural application of wellbeing.
The Patron’s programme for the Community National schools under the ‘Beliefs, Religions and GMGY Support Materials’ document says ‘Children learn about religion and beliefs’ and ‘this increases a child’s religious literacy’. It does not say ‘this increases a child’s literacy about religions and beliefs’.
It says ‘Children also learn from religion’ but it does not say they ‘learn from atheism’ or ‘learn from nonreligious beliefs’. We don’t believe they should learn ‘from’ any religion or belief, as that is not objective, critical and pluralistic, and the imbalance adds to the problem.
Various ETB school websites refer to ‘the five major world religions’ but not to any major
nonreligious beliefs. Typical wording is ‘Strive to be equitable in teaching about the five major world religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and Hinduism) and also be equally respectful of all other belief systems.’
The ‘Non-religious Philosophies of Life Support Materials’ document cites Peter Boghossian as saying the term ‘atheism’ is contentious. It then says ‘Atheism is not an affirmative belief that there is no god nor does it answer any other question about what a person believes. It is simply a rejection of the assertion that there are gods. Atheism is too often defined incorrectly as a belief system.’
This itself is a contentious description of atheism, not shared by Atheist Ireland or by all atheists. We believe atheism is a positive affirmative belief about the nature of reality and morality, and that it does answer some other important questions about what a person believes.
Our position is consistent with international human rights law, and with the European Court of Human Rights recognising atheism as a belief in the context of being a coherent worldview that is cogent, serious, important, and worthy of respect in a democratic society. This is much more than ‘simply a rejection of the assertion that there are gods.’
A wellbeing policy must address this structural gap. Otherwise, “respect” remains an aspiration, while “ethos” remains an enforceable legal duty.
5. Admissions discrimination undermines belonging
The Equal Status Act 2000 also undermines the Department’s stated aim of inclusive and welcoming schools.
Section 7 of the Equal Status Act prohibits discrimination by educational establishments in relation to admissions, access to courses or facilities, participation, expulsion, or sanctions. However, the same section permits exceptions for schools with religious values.
At primary level it also allows a school that promotes certain religious values to refuse admission to a student who is not of a particular religious denomination where it is proved that refusal is essential to maintain the ethos of the school. At second level schools can give preference to co-religionists and refuse access if they can prove a child will undermine their ethos.
At primary level, the Equal Status Act allows recognised minority faith schools to give priority to children of that minority religion where the school provides religious instruction or religious education of the same or similar ethos.
The wellbeing implications are obvious. A child who knows that their family’s beliefs could legally be treated as a reason to prefer another child, or even to exclude them in order to protect a school ethos, cannot reasonably be expected to experience that school system as equally welcoming.
Even where these provisions are rarely used in practice, their existence sends a powerful social signal. It says that some children belong naturally within the school ethos, while others are accommodated only conditionally.
That is inconsistent with a wellbeing framework based on belonging, equality, and respect for diversity and indeed pluralism.
6. The right to not attend religious instruction must be practical and stigma-free
The Education Act and the Intermediate Education (Ireland) Act 1878 provides that the Minister shall not require any student to attend instruction in any subject that is contrary to the conscience of the parent, or remain in attendance at religious instruction, (Section 30-2(e) Education Act 1998, Section 7 Intermediate Education (Ireland) Act 1878).
Atheist Ireland deliberately uses the phrase “not attend” rather than “opt out” because this is reflected in Article 44.2.4 of the Constitution. The constitutional and statutory right is not a right to sit silently at the back of the same class while religious instruction continues. It is a right to not attend religious instruction or indeed any religious teaching (Teagasc Creidimh). This is an issue when wellbeing is informed by the ethos of the Patron.
In practice, however, children from atheist, secular, minority faith, and mixed-belief families are often not offered another subject or meaningful alternative activity. They may be left sitting in the religion class, physically present while being supposedly exempt. This happens at both primary and second level.
That arrangement is harmful to wellbeing in several ways.
First, it marks the child as different. Secondly, it fails to vindicate the child’s and parents’ rights. Thirdly, it gives the child no equal educational alternative. Fourthly, it can make parents reluctant to exercise their rights because they do not want their child isolated, embarrassed, or supervised as an administrative problem instead of a constitutional right.
A wellbeing policy that values belonging must require schools to provide practical, non-discriminatory, and stigma-free arrangements for children who do not attend religious instruction, worship, faith formation, sacramental preparation, or indeed any curriculum subject that is not objective, critical and pluralistic.
This should not be left to ad hoc local negotiation. The Department should issue clear, binding statutory guidelines as under Article 44.2.4 of the Constitution this responsibility is the duty of the Oireachtas and a condition of the aid to the school.
7. The ethos of schools can shape the wellbeing curriculum itself
The Education Act 1998 recognises that every school has a patron, that patron determines the ethos of the school, and that any religious education/instruction/Patron’s programme may be provided in line with that ethos (Section 30.2(d)). The ethos of schools influences the morals, values, and beliefs of the school.
This matters because wellbeing is not a neutral bolt-on. The Wellbeing Specification includes areas such as identity, belonging, relationships, ethical understanding, family, values, emotional development, sexuality, and community. These are precisely the areas most likely to be influenced by a school’s ethos.
If the Department allows each patron’s ethos to shape the delivery of wellbeing without clear human-rights safeguards, the wellbeing curriculum may reproduce the very exclusion that it is supposed to address.
For example, a child from an atheist family may be taught about belonging within a school community whose symbols, ceremonies, and language assume religious belief. A child from a minority religion may be taught about respect for diversity while their own tradition is treated as peripheral. A child from a secular family may be taught about values in a setting that implies values are ultimately grounded in religion.
This is not just about the ethos of schools or the Patron’s programmes. The main aim of the state curriculum at second level is to develop values to enable students to come to an understanding of religion and its relevance to life, relationships, society and the wider world. This aim disrespects our philosophical beliefs because it is not objective, critical and pluralistic.
The Report from the Oireachtas Education Committee in 2019 recommended that:
14.The Committee recommends that the Education Act 1998 be amended or at least reviewed, so that ethos can no longer be used as a barrier to the effective, objective and factual teaching of the RSE and SPHE curriculum to which every student is entitled.
15.The Committee recommends that the necessary legislative amendments required to remove the role of ethos as a barrier to the objective and factual delivery of the RSE and SPHE curriculums be made as soon as possible and at the latest by the end of 2019.
17.The Committee recommends that the specific policy issues raised in the report should be integrated to all curriculums where appropriate and form part of a whole school approach.
The Minister Hildegarde Naughton was a member of this Oireachtas Committee at the time so she is aware of all the Recommendations in this Report and the need for structural change.
The issue is not whether religious schools may have their own ethos. The issue is whether the State may fund and require attendance at schools without ensuring that the rights and wellbeing of all children are protected equally within them.
8. UN and Council of Europe recommendations
The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child has directly addressed these issues. In its 2023 Concluding Observations on Ireland, the Committee urged the State to guarantee the right of all children to practise freely their religion or belief.
It recommended amending the Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018 and the Equal Status Acts to remove exceptions based on religious or ethos grounds, establishing statutory guidelines to ensure children’s right not to attend religious classes, and developing a time-bound strategy with adequate resources for increasing the availability of both multi-denominational and non-denominational schools.
These recommendations are directly relevant to wellbeing. They concern not only legal equality but also the lived experience of children in schools. A child’s wellbeing is affected when the State fails to ensure equal access, fails to provide practical alternatives to religious instruction, and fails to provide schools whose ethos is neutral between religious and nonreligious beliefs.
The Council of Europe’s European Commission against Racism and Intolerance has also raised concerns. Its sixth report on Ireland was adopted on 1 July 2025 and published on 28 October 2025. ECRI noted that religious discrimination in school admissions might still be happening in practice, that publicly funded schools promoting religious values can refuse to admit pupils where this is considered essential to maintain ethos, and that school ethos can affect the delivery of relationships and sexuality education.
It recommended reviewing the legislation to ensure that the exemption for refusal of admission based on religion does not adversely affect access to education, including reviewing the definition of ethos and what is required to prove that refusal is essential to maintain ethos.
These international recommendations reinforce the need for the Department’s wellbeing policy to address religion and belief based discrimination explicitly.
9. Conclusion
Wellbeing in education cannot be separated from equality, conscience, and belonging.
Ireland’s education system asks many children to attend schools whose ethos does not reflect their family beliefs. It then tells those children that they are included, while failing to provide the legal and practical safeguards that would make inclusion real.
The Department’s next wellbeing policy should not treat this as a peripheral issue. For atheist, secular, minority faith, and mixed-belief families, it is central to whether children feel respected, safe, and equal in school.
A school is not inclusive merely because it welcomes children into a pre-existing ethos. It is inclusive when every child can belong without having to absorb, avoid, or quietly endure beliefs that their family does not share. Inclusion for schools means inclusion in their ethos. We do not want our children to be included in a particular ideological view of the world that rejects their family values.
Atheist Ireland urges the Department to use this wellbeing review to move from aspirational inclusion to enforceable equality.
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