A PRESBYTERIAN Church report on integrated education in Northern Ireland was sharply criticised yesterday on the last day of the General Assembly in Belfast.
One minister, the Rev Bill Moore of the Taughmonagh congregation in South Belfast, called on his fellow clerics to distance themselves from the paper which in spite of assurances from its authors, was seen as negative towards the system.
The report, which received the approval of the assembly and which had been forwarded to the North's Department of Education favoured integrated schools which remain under education board control rather than those with maintained status, which were parent dominated.
Only 2 per cent of children are educated at integrated schools.
The majority of pupils attend either predominantly Protestant state controlled or Catholic maintained schools.
Mr Moore, chaplain to Lagan College, the first integrated school established in Northern Ireland, said it was "absolutely scandalous" that the report should question the motives of parents in selecting such schools.
Admitting his anger at the paper's contents, he told delegates "I object to any quango writing in my name to the Department of Education criticising integrated schools not under control. All new supporters of integrated education, get on your word processors and typewriters and disown this. They are not writing in my name.
The Rev John Morrow, a lecturer at the Irish School of Ecumenics, said the report presented an inaccurate and superficial understanding of what is happening".
Parents of both religions needed tremendous commitment and had spent considerable sums of money in establishing integrated schools, he said.
"In the process they have built extremely important relationships with each other, and I am talking about parents now, not just children, which have been an important cement at this very difficult time in history," said Mr Morrow.
The Rev Jim Campbell, of Cooke Centenary Church on Belfast's Ormeau Road where tensions are running high over loyalist parades spoke of a bus from Lagan College which collected children from all sections of the community each morning as it passed along the main thoroughfare.
"It brings together people from a mixture of social, political and religious backgrounds and they are taught and live together in harmony at the integrated school," he said. "What is happening there I would like to see happening throughout this society.
The Rev Derek Poots, deputy clerk of assembly and secretary of the board of education which prepared the report, rejected charges that the church was concerned with protecting its own influence but said it had a contemporary role to play in ensuring that ethnical and moral standards were maintained in the classroom.
He said the church was considering approaching the Education Minister to ask for more representation on the board of governors of controlled integrated schools, and indicated a joint initiative with the Catholic Church could be possible.
"And I would hope, and I dare say this, that if we could reach a model where transferor and maintained church representation was increased we might even encourage our Roman Catholic brothers to think seriously about supporting the controlled school option, he said.
Later in the day during a debate on child protection guidelines, approved by the assembly, a Dublin minister spoke of her family's suffering. The Rev Katherine Meyer of Abbey Church said. "I rise to speak because I have experience in my family of child sexual abuse carried out by a member of the clergy and of the long term anguish and damage that such abuse can cause.
"I would simply like to point out to this assembly that in my experience the damage which is done is often done not only by the abuser himself, but also by the subsequent conduct of the church and its representatives which, when unprepared, can often appear tight lipped and concerned only with the protection of its own clergy and not with those who have had the courage to speak out about the abuse which they have suffered."
The Rev Norman Cameron, of Second Killyleagh and convenor of the working party on child protection, outlining what was contained in the guidelines, said. "We may not be able simply through church guidelines to legislate against madmen and tragedy of a Dunblane. However, we may be able to do something to limit the opportunities for the Thomas Hamiltons of this world to thrive and advance.
"To ignore this issue today in the light of recent government legislation and events could be seen as grossly negligent."
The Presbyterian Moderator, Dr Harry Allen, in his closing remarks to the assembly, renewed his appeal to the IRA to call a ceasefire. "I urge them to show wisdom and courage and to announce a permanent end to all hostility and move away from armed activity towards the peace we long to achieve," he said.
