Irish teacher who has been punished for standing up to “transgender” ideology asks why the Church has betrayed its Christian faith

Transgender ideology is inherently anti-Christian and leaves young people tragically and irreversibly harmed.  Enoch Burke, an Irish teacher who is a Christian, has been persecuted by the state for standing up for children and his Christian beliefs.  His crime was to refuse to call a child “they/them” and to return to his place of work while the appeal for his dismissal is waiting to be heard. For this “crime,” he has spent more than 500 days in jail in three stints and faces fines of over €190,000.

Enoch Burke has been involved in legal disputes with Wilson’s Hospital School in County Westmeath, Ireland, since August 2022.

Wilson’s Hospital School is a Church of Ireland school. The Church of Ireland is a Christian church that traces its roots to the earliest days of Christianity in Ireland and retains both Catholic and Reformed traditions. It states that the Church is committed to safeguarding and protecting children and vulnerable adults from harm.

Burke was suspended and later fired from the Church’s school after refusing to address a pupil – who was undergoing “transitioning” to appear as a different gender – with his chosen pronoun and a new name. Following his suspension, he continued to show up to the school in an attempt to teach lessons, resulting in a court injunction that barred him from the school grounds.

Burke has repeatedly breached court orders to stay away from the school, leading to multiple imprisonments and significant fines.  He says he was wrongfully imprisoned due to his objections to “transgenderism” and continues to assert his right to work at the school.  His appeal against his dismissal from the school has not yet been heard.

“Judge after judge has refused to vindicate and uphold his constitutional right to freedom of religion and expression,” his brother, Josiah Burke, told Newsweek last year.

“Enoch Burke’s ongoing imprisonment is the true face of the ‘inclusive’ LGBTQI+ movement: a sincere, upright Christian teacher arrested and imprisoned after simply refusing to endorse and affirm transgenderism, an anti-Christian ideology that entraps vulnerable children and puts them on a fast track to abuse, mutilation, depression and sadly for so many, suicide,” Josiah said.

On 21 December 2024, Burke was released from prison but the judge doubled the daily fine to €1,400 and directed government representatives to explain how to collect the €193,000 in fines Burke now owes.

On 6 January 2025, Burke returned to the school premises.

In the meantime, his father was imprisoned for 44 days on charges of pushing a female Garda (police) against a radiator when leaving the courtroom after attending a hearing for his son Enoch.

Further reading:

• Irish Teacher Enoch Burke Jailed Amid Transgender Pronoun Dispute—Timeline, Newsweek, 3 September 2024
• Enoch Burke released from prison as judge doubles fine for showing up at school, the Irish Times, 20 December 2024
• Enoch Burke given two weeks to make submissions on contempt fines, RTE, 21 January 2025

The following is a series of tweets posted by Enoch Burke’s Twitter profile to which we have added some comments denoted in [square brackets].

14 December 2024

Tonight, teacher Enoch Burke spends his 506th night in a prison cell. His crime was to say “No” to affirming a child on the road to “transitioning.”

Puberty blockers. Medication. Surgery. Irreversible harm for life. Bitter and hopeless regret. He is right.

20 December 2024

Judge David Nolan announced in court this morning that if anyone spoke in the court, he would permanently ban them from all future hearings. The Supreme Court has ruled that this is illegal. Enoch Burke immediately jumped to his feet and objected to this sinister and unlawful direction. Judge Nolan refused to retract the statement, later denying he had even made it. All of this is available on the court Digital Audio Recording (“DAR”).

On the national lunchtime television news (RTÉ), reporter Orla O’Donnell did not mention one word regarding the above events. The public deserves to know the full truth. By withholding this, Orla O’Donnell and RTÉ are utterly failing in their duty and are protecting this judge in his unlawful behaviour.

24 December 2024

Teacher Enoch Burke was imprisoned for over 500 days after refusing to use “they/them” pronouns for a child. His father Sean Burke is in prison this Christmas Eve.

Sean Burke, father of Enoch Burke, is in a prison cell this Christmas Eve after a charge was brought against him by a Garda Síochána (Irish Police).

Sean Burke was accused of pushing a female Garda against a radiator during an appearance by his son Enoch Burke in the Court of Appeal on 7 March 2023. He strenuously denies the charge.

The alleged incident, of a matter of seconds, allegedly took place in a congested area as Sean Burke was trying to exit the courtroom with his wife in front of him. There were at least seven Gardaí around the door. The alleged incident took place in the one location where there was no CCTV. There were no witnesses other than Sean Burke and surrounding Gardaí. The Garda who made the allegation, Victoria Fisher, was seen on CCTV seconds after the alleged incident walking in and out of the courthouse, chatting with colleagues and eventually walking away from the Four Courts.

Where Will It End?

As the Enoch Burke case has developed over the past months, many people have asked us the question, where will it end?

This case should never have begun. It began when Enoch Burke was commanded by Niamh McShane, Principal of Wilson’s Hospital School, to use the “they/them” pronouns for a student. It was a command to endorse the “transition” of this child from male to female, which of course is not possible.

But this entire case would never have begun if Enoch Burke hadn’t been betrayed by the Church.

The Betrayal Of Enoch Burke By The Church

Bishop Pat Storey and Archbishop John McDowell of the Church of Ireland have never uttered a word about the case of Enoch Burke. The words of Scripture in the Prophet Isaiah calls such people “unfaithful shepherds,” “…dumb dogs, they cannot bark” (Isaiah 56:10). Take the collars and cloaks from these people and there is a hatred of Christian truth underneath – silent for two and half years while a teacher who upheld their own ethos languishes in the darkness of a prison cell.

It is starkly hypocritical that Catholic Archbishop Eamon Martin will sit with Archbishop John McDowell on Christmas Day and deliver a Christmas message to the nation. Does Eamon Martin know that John McDowell has betrayed Enoch Burke by his silence?

We spoke recently to Eamon Martin, Catholic Archbishop and Primate of All Ireland and asked him to speak out when the Irish Government was changing the definition of gender from God’s definition, male and female, to include a multiplicity of genders. Archbishop Martin remained silent, and only publicly addressed the issue on X [now Twitter] five minutes AFTER the vote was called in Dáil Éireann (Irish Parliament).

Eamon Martin, Catholic Archbishop, and John McDowell, Protestant Archbishop – these men are sitting together, agreeing together, travelling together, going to football matches together. They are chums.

These men are betraying the parents of this country by their silence on the destruction of their children through the perversion of the new sex education curriculum in Irish schools – a curriculum that promotes pornography and every form of perversion, filth and depravity to children in every school in Ireland.

When you hear the “Christmas message” from these men this Christmas, stand back and ask why they have nothing to say about transgender ideology. Are they what they say they are, the successors of the Apostle Paul, who lived and died for the truth?

Don’t be fooled by the references to “lay people” – if Archbishop Eamon Martin cannot speak out against transgenderism himself, then he doesn’t believe in Christian truth. He is working with the Government and the Courts against the Truth.

Nowhere was this more evident than when Minister for Education Norma Foley was questioned earlier this year on why transgenderism, and every other form of depravity, was being forced upon young children in Irish schools, primary and secondary. When pressed, she acknowledged that the new curriculum had been introduced after extensive consultations with the Church – Catholic and Protestant. The Church worked together with the Government.

Take Back Your Children

We appeal to parents to embrace their duty to “train up their children in the way they should go,” regardless of what any Archbishop says or does. Write to these Archbishops. Challenge them on their hypocrisy.

Don’t allow your children to be betrayed into lives of darkness, regret and ruin. Take back your children this Christmas.

9 January 2025

Enoch Burke has attended his place of work, Wilson’s Hospital School, since schools returned on 6 January. He has been forced by the school to stand outdoors in freezing temperatures, simply because he would not endorse transgenderism and use “they/them” pronouns for a child.

The ongoing situation with Enoch Burke could be over today if the Church did what it should do.

Wilson’s Hospital School is a Church of Ireland school. Its patron is Bishop Pat Storey. Enoch Burke has been betrayed by Pat Storey. For the past three years, she has remained silent. Pat Storey stated that she had “full confidence“ in Principal Niamh McShane after McShane demanded that all staff endorse transgenderism. It is clear that Bishop Pat Storey and indeed Church of Ireland Archbishop John McDowell do not agree with the ethos of their own church, which clearly upholds the basic Christian teaching that “God made them male and female.”

This issue is not merely about Enoch Burke. It is about the fact that LGBTQ+ ideology, including transgenderism, is being taught today to over 1 million pupils in every school across Ireland through the new [Social, Personal and Health Education] SPHE curriculum. Meanwhile, the Church is silent.

[Note: From September 2023, Irish secondary school students in junior cycle began learning about consent, gender identity and online pornography, in a revamp of the SPHE curriculum. A review found that the previous SPHE curriculum focused too much on biology.  The main area of controversy that arose when a draft was published was that of gender identity. The term gender identity was defined as a “person’s felt internal and individual experience of gender which may or may not correspond with” biology. Read more HERE and HERE.]

In his recent Christmas message, Archbishop Eamon Martin spoke about battlefields far away – Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan – but the Archbishop ignores the battlefield in the schools of Ireland, on his own doorstep. Children are being forbidden to have a Christian belief in schools today – commanded to use the “they” pronouns and bow to every form of sexual perversion.

[Note: Interestingly, some will point out that demons refer to themselves as they/them or we/us.]

When Minister for Education Norma Foley was recently questioned about the new SPHE curriculum, she eventually admitted that extensive consultation had taken place with the Church, and that all parties had signed off on the curriculum.

The new SPHE curriculum is depraved. It is simply an education in every form of perverted sexual activity. Whistle-blowers have revealed the training SPHE teachers are receiving is, in their own words, “satanic.”

If the church leaders have signed off on this curriculum, then the Archbishops need to come out and speak to the nation on this issue.

Finally, shame on those so-called “conservatives,” such as Daily Mail “journalist” Brenda Power, who says the nation should “ignore Enoch Burke” – according to them we should ignore transgender ideology, ignore the destruction of our youth, ignore the utter devastation caused by this ideology on many of the most vulnerable young people in our society. Beware of these so-called “conservatives” and do not be deceived by them.

30 January 2025

After 44 days of unjust incarceration, including Christmas in prison, Sean Burke (father of teacher Enoch Burke) has been released.

The Gardaí secured a conviction against Burke with the assistance of a biased judge, Ronan Munro who from the start of the case openly demeaned and humiliated Sean Burke.

Sean Burke was imprisoned after events in the Court of Appeal on 7 March 2023, when the judges made the extraordinary announcement that the Enoch Burke case had “nothing to do with transgenderism.”

Those judges were President George Birmingham, Judge John Edwards and Judge Máire Whelan who should not ever have been a judge and whose appointment to the bench was shrouded in controversy.

Unjust prison sentences do not change the truth and should deter no one from professing and practising their religious belief.

Featured image: Enoch Burke, taken from ‘High Court orders release of Enoch Burke from prison’