A new national directory
The strategy aims to spread religious teaching from the classroom and back into homes and parishes,642-825
The Belfast Telegraph reports, Dec 6.
Describing it as a “time-bomb” thrown into the religious education establishment, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin called for a switch away from schools to new ways in which the parish and the family could hand on the Catholic faith to future generations.
He added: “What is being proposed in the directory is revolutionary for our parishes.
“It is an invitation to break away from our current situation, which is overly school-oriented, and bring back into the picture in a more focused way the central role of the parish and the family.
“It is not a document entrusted to the catechetical establishment. It is a time-bomb thrown into the catechetical establishment and indeed into the religious education establishment.
“It is a reminder that catechesis does not end with the Leaving Certificate,” Dr Martin said as he welcomed the directory “wholeheartedly”. The manual — which is priced at €16.99 — comes amid a backdrop of falling priest numbers and decreasing Mass attendance.
‘Share the Good News’ is the first national Catholic directory on religious instruction in Ireland and is said to provide “practical guidance to ordinary Catholics at events such as baptism,642-821
marriage and funerals”.
Read more: