Suzanne Harrington: It’s refreshing that no religion is acknowledged on the census – Irish Examiner

I know youre never meant to talk religion, but the census is making me do it. We had to fill it out, on account of being on a visit to Ireland last Sunday night, in a hotel with the fam an atheist, an undecided, a havent-a-clue, a secular Jew, and myself, a Catholic by birth. I chant Om at yoga, but couldnt find a box for that. Instead we all ticked the no-religion box. That this box topped the list felt significant.

Obviously, for millions of people everywhere, the freedom to practice your religion is a basic right, to be honoured, protected and respected for anyone who wants to do so. That goes without saying, but Im saying it anyway.

But for those of us who dont, for all kinds of reasons that are nobody elses business, its refreshing to be acknowledged, rather than regarded by the census demographers as some kind of defective add-on at the end. Not being aligned to a religion does not necessarily make you an atheist the Guardian Soulmates dating site, before it was rendered obsolete by Tinder, used to have a handy spiritual but not religious box; the idea of definitively declaring that there is not a god seems as unknowable as definitively declaring that there is one. Whatever. This column is too short to get stuck in. All we know is that we dont know.

Meanwhile, back on earth, the head chaplain at Harvard University, elected last year by thirty other Harvard chaplains of various denominations, is an atheist humanist - Greg Epstein, author of Good Without God: What A Billion Non-Religious People Do Believe. Despite some initial hand-wringing, turns out that this atheist humanist - who supports humans directly rather than filtering human relationships via a deity - is doing a great job.

The unforgettable character of Elizabeth Zott, the scientist created by author Bonnie Garmus in her believe-the-hype new novel Lessons in Chemistry, declares her atheism on American national television in 1961. Why, she asks with impeccable logic, cant her science-based belief system be respected the same as the story-based belief system of a religious person? Why indeed.

Now, finally, in 2022 Ireland, to not believe has been given the same validation as to believe. Great. But should to believe / to not believe be anyones business but your own? Why the continuing Irish link between church and state? Why is religion still embedded in state schools?

By all means, practice your religion in your home, your place of worship, your community but state schools are for everyone, and not everyone practices the same religion, or practices any religion at all. Is it fair and equal for one religion in Irelands case, Catholicism to be served up as part of the school curriculum, to be baked into the school day? For those who want it, let it be an optional add-on, an after-school thing. Religious indoctrination of any kind has no place in state institutions. Isnt this obvious by now?

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Suzanne Harrington: It's refreshing that no religion is acknowledged on the census - Irish Examiner