@angelobottone@qoto.org

Pre-Rally for Life talk with Isabel Vaughan-Spruce https://familysolidarity.org/pre-rally-for-life-talk-with-isabel-vaughan-spruce/

CW Long post, original content.

What Census 2022 tells us about religion in Ireland

The number of Catholics in Ireland has dropped, according to the results of Census 2022, but this change must be properly interpreted. While there has been a decline among the Catholic population, a lot of immigrants are religious, and the way the religion question was rephrased since the last Census has almost certainly had an impact on the results.

Although Ireland remains an overwhelmingly Catholic country (nominally at least), with 69pc of the population identifying as ‘Catholic’, there has been a big rise in the number of people who ticked the “no religion” box in the last Census, from 451,941 in 2016 to 736,210 in 2022, accounting for 14pc of the population.

Over a fifth of those who say they have ‘no religion’ are non-nationals, which is higher than the percentage in the overall population who are from overseas.

Immigration explains these trends but the significant rise of “no religion” is due also to the changes in the religion question.

The Census 2016 question asked: “What is your religion?”. After a consultation, the question was changed to “What is your religion, if any?” and the first response offered was “no religion”, whereas in 2016 it was the last option.

During the consultation process, Professor Stephen Bullivant, on behalf of the Iona Institute, requested that the question remain in its original format to allow proper comparison census by census. He also suggested that a separate question measuring actual levels of religious practice be included as well. (The submission can be found here.)

At the following meeting of the Census Advisory Group, Atheist Ireland were lobbying hard for two separate questions: “Do you have a religion?” and “If yes, which...?”. Prof. Bullivant suggested keeping the 2016 question and including “if any”. This suggestion was accepted but the CSO also offered “no religion” as the first option, which is unusual because in polls, the “none of the above” option is generally presented at the end, not at the beginning.

This change makes the comparison with the past quite difficult.

For instance, in 2022 there was a significant drop of those who identify as atheists (-87.4pc) and agnostic (-42.4pc). Most likely, those are now recorded under the more general “no religion” answer. But “no religion” would also include people who might not belong to an organised denomination and still consider themselves spiritual or even believers.

An RTE poll, for instance, found that only about one third who said they don’t belong to a religion were agnostics or atheist. Many continued to believe, without belonging.

Since 2016, the number of Catholics in Ireland - including non-Irish citizens - has dropped 4.9pc, from 3,696,644 to 3,515,861. But the Catholic share of a fast-growing population has dropped further, from 78.3pc in 2016, to 69.8pc last year. This garnered a lot of headlines.

The number of Anglicans (which includes members of the Church of Ireland, Church of England, and Episcopalians) slightly increased (1.7pc) and much of this growth was accounted for by immigration.

Membership of certain other Christian denominations fell by more than membership of the Catholic Church: Lutherans -25.5pc, Unitarians -14.8, Methodists -12.7pc. Evangelicals experienced almost as big a drop as the Catholic Church at -7.7pc.

Buddhist were also down -3.3pc, while there was huge surge of the percentage of Jainist +160.4pc, Hindu +140.7pc, +Rastafari 78.1pc, Zoroastian +74.3pc. But they remain small in number.

It is interesting to note regional differences in the Census 2022 results. The highest percentage professing “no religion” is in Dún Laoghaire/Rathdown County Council (23.9pc), the lowest is in Monaghan (6.8pc).

The highest percentage of Catholics is in Mayo (79.6pc), while the lowest is in the Dublin City Council area where only 52.6pc identify as such. The centre of Dublin has a very high number of immigrants.

The highest percentage of Muslims is in South Dublin (3.3pc), whereas the lowest is in Wicklow (0.7pc).

Ireland’s religious landscape is indeed changing but it is not easy to compare results when the key question asked about religion has changed so much.

Marriage in Ireland still declining despite a bumper 2022 https://familysolidarity.org/marriage-in-ireland-still-declining-despite-a-bumper-2022/

Bénédicte Colin on the European Certificate of Parenthood https://familysolidarity.org/benedicte-colin-on-the-european-certificate-of-parenthood/

Webinar on the European Certificate of Parenthood https://familysolidarity.org/webinar-on-the-european-certificate-of-parenthood/

FAFCE calls the European Commission to include surrogacy in the review of its EU Directive on human trafficking https://familysolidarity.org/fafce-calls-the-european-commission-to-include-surrogacy-in-the-review-of-its-eu-directive-on-human-trafficking/

Webinar: A special family https://familysolidarity.org/webinar-a-special-family/

Children are left unprotected against extreme pornography https://familysolidarity.org/children-are-left-unprotected-against-extreme-pornography/

NCCA confirms worst suspicions of parents about gender ideology https://familysolidarity.org/ncca-confirms-worst-suspicions-of-parents-about-gender-ideology/

My Researchgate profile
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Angelo-Bottone/stats/report/weekly/2023-03-05

A hundred of experts from all over the world, will work this Friday, March 3 to publish the #CasablancaDeclaration for the abolition of surrogacy, draw the attention of States and convince them that it is necessary to stop #reproductiveexploitation
#surrogacyabolition #surrogacy

CW LONG POST ORIGINAL CONTENT

A new organ donor bill is ethically questionable

If a proposed new law is passed, after you die your organs can be removed from your body for medical purposes unless you expressly say beforehand that you do not want this to happen. Consent is otherwise assumed. As usual, the law is going through the various parliamentary stages without proper debate, even though the proposal is ethically questionable. An Organ Donor Register, instead, should be established.

The proposed law is called the ‘Human Tissue 2022 Bill’. It covers issues such as the donation and transplantation of organs from deceased persons.

At present, an opt-in system exists. This means that only those who have expressly declared their intention to donate organs after they die will have them removed from their bodies, and even then only with the final approval of the family.

The new regime will mean consent is assumed, although final authorisation from a designated family member will still be needed.

The proposed regime is motivated by the good intention of addressing the problem of a shortage of organs for transplant in Ireland, but it is still ethically questionable as donation should arise only from an informed and deliberate decision on a person’s part.

Presumed consent is based instead on the assumption that we are all aware that our organs are available for transplantation upon death and we are happy with that. But what is this assumption really based on?

The HSE’s own consent policy says: “Consent involves a process of communication about the proposed intervention in which the person has received sufficient information to enable them to understand the nature, potential risks and benefits of the proposed intervention”.

It is very unlikely that the new system of presumed consent will meet these criteria.

To make the new system more ethical, patients should be explicitly asked to express their opinion on the matter when attending a hospital or their GP. This will prompt awareness and provoke conversation about donation, which must remain a choice freely and explicitly made and not assumed. Taking without asking is not giving.

As suggested by the Irish Kidney Association, there should be an Organ Donor Register, where all wishes – to opt in or out – are explicitly recorded. “Knowing that a loved one had proactively recorded their wish to be an organ donor makes the family decision to consent a much easier proposition”, a representative of the Irish Kidney Association told the Oireachtas.

What is positive in this new Bill is that it is not inspired by a principle of absolute bodily autonomy of the patients, but it requires the involvement of their families, who could even overrule the decision of the deceased and veto the donation.

There are many reasons why the ultimate word should be with the families rather than with the individual.

While it is important to honour the wish of the deceased, we need to consider that personal decisions affect others, particularly the family. Some cultures place special importance on respecting the integrity of the body after death. Moreover, when organ donation happens against the wish of the family, they might refuse to cooperate, or their discontent could also affect the work of the health-care staff.

A proper ethical system in this area should follow two basic principles: explicit (not presumed) consent from the individual, and approval from the family following the death of the person. The second principle is still followed, but not the first and more important one.

Photo by Robina Weermeijer on Unsplash

A record of how eugenics has taken hold in Ireland
https://ionainstitute.ie/a-record-of-how-eugenics-has-taken-hold-in-ireland/