Mr Quinn is, bit by bit, challenging the stranglehold that the Catholic Church has over education in the Republic.
He does it in a proper, diplomatic way, of course, but he has already begun a long-term process of taking some of the country's schools out of Catholic control and handing them over to more ecumenical interests.
Now
Mr Quinn has set the cat among the pigeons by questioning the amount of
time that is spent teaching religion in Irish primary schools.
According
to the Irish Department of Education's rules, 30 minutes a day – two
and a half hours a week – is devoted to religion, compared with 60
minutes for science and physical education (PE).
But a recent Irish
National Teachers Organisation (INTO) survey found over 70% of teachers
were spending more than the required time on religion.
The extra time
usually goes on preparing children for First Communion and Confirmation.
Mr
Quinn last week faced an unreceptive – bordering on hostile - annual
conference of the Catholic Primary School Managers Association.
He asked
them: "Can we really afford to continue providing a mere 60 minutes,
per week on scientific instruction or, for that matter, 60 minutes per
week of PE?"
He suggested that preparation for the sacraments could take
place in the parish, outside school hours.
Needless
to say, his speech did not go down very well with the Catholic education
hierarchy, who take for granted that the nation's schools at their
disposal as a means of propagating their religion.
CPSMA
vice chairperson Fr Denis McNelis, said they were happy to talk about
the timing and method of the teaching of religion, but "I think there
would be widespread disapproval on the part of parents and most teachers
if we were to go down the road of removing entirely sacramental
preparation from the school".
Of course, the Catholic Church has always put huge emphasis on its influence in education.
It
realised centuries ago that you need to get at children before they are
at an age when they might be able to resist religious indoctrination.
They need to be told that they are Catholics at a very early stage in
their lives and the message must be reinforced relentlessly.
School
– particularly primary school – is the perfect place for this
brainwashing to be accomplished. For the rest of their lives they will
regard themselves as "Catholic", even if they never set foot inside a
church again..
Every concordat that the Vatican manages to wangle with a state will always give them privileged access to education.
The
Church will say: "If we didn't provide it, there would be no
education."
This may be true in some parts of the developing world, but
the quid pro quo is that the Church then uses its schools for relentless
indoctrination and evangelisation.
Ruairi Quinn
hopes to challenge this, although the Catholic Church in Ireland still
controls almost all the schools in the country (despite these being
publicly-funded schools) and will not give them up without resistance.
The minister told reporters after the conference that while he had no
current plans for changes to existing arrangements, he insisted the
question he was posing was not "rhetorical".
He added science was
important and "it all starts in primary."
Irish
primary pupils spend 40% of their time on science – half the
international average – and 10% on religion, more than double the global
norm.
The recommended minimum one hour a week for PE is the lowest of 30 EU countries.
Mr
Quinn is an astute politician.
He won't have a face-to-face
confrontation with the Church but they must now be aware that he's got
them in his sights.
I repeat, somewhat ruefully, where is the UK's Ruairi Quinn?