Leave the church in 3 easy steps

enter your details leave a message of defection enjoy your freedom

In Ireland there was a way to formally record that you were no longer a Catholic and require the church to record that fact. Over 12,000 people started this "Declaration of Defection" process. But in April 2011 the Catholic Church changed church law and removed the option to record formal defections.

Cormac Flynn, Paul Dunbar and Grainne O'Sullivan were the pioneers of CountMeOut.ie who took on the church and we salute them. They closed CountMeOut.ie after church law was changed to frustrate people trying to record their defection. Read more details here.

NotMe.ie believes that if people tell the church they have defected then it should take a reality check and listen to them and correct their records. Young infants do not have a choice when they are baptised but adults have the right to set the record straight.

NotMe.ie lets you informally and symbolically leave the Catholic Church. It has no impact on the Catholic Church's view of your religious standing but is a way to identify as not Catholic. This symbolic gesture supports the separation of church and state. It does not signify or support atheism or humanism as many religious people also support church and state separation.

NotMe.ie is maintained by Atheist Ireland an Irish advocacy group, that does not recognize church law or state submission to church law, promoting atheism and reason over superstition and supernaturalism, and an ethical, secular society where the State does not support or finance or give special treatment or privelege to any religion.

Atheist Ireland is a member of Atheist Alliance International, an umbrella organisation of groups and individuals in the United States and around the world committed to promoting and defending reason and the atheist worldview. www.atheist.ie