THE TRANSFER of Catholic schools to lay trusts is not the church getting out of education, the chairman of the Bishops’ Commission for Education has said.
Speaking at a Mass to launch the Presentation Brothers Schools Trust in Cork, Bishop of Kilmore Dr Leo O’Reilly said lay trusts are “the first shoots of a new flourishing Catholic education”.
Six trusts have been established by religious orders in recent years to take over the running of Catholic schools. These include the Loreto Trust Board in Ireland, which oversees 30 schools; the Edmund Rice Schools Trust, responsible for 97 schools; and Ceist Catholic Education, which oversees 112 secondary schools formerly under the care of the Sisters of Mercy and five other orders.
The Presentation Brothers Schools Trust is responsible for eight schools, three at primary and five at secondary level.
In his homily on Saturday at St Joseph’s Parish Church in Wilton, Dr O’Reilly said when the news that religious were going to hand their schools over to lay trusts first came to the fore it was seen by many as the church getting out of education. “That was completely off the mark,” he said. “These trusts are church bodies just as much as religious congregations are. The only difference is that their members are lay.”
Dr O’Reilly added: “Far from being a sign that the church is getting out of education, this trust and others like it are the first shoots of a new flourishing of Catholic education . . .”
