The Burke family of Castlebar, Co Mayo have been back in the news recently after Enoch Burke’s release from prison and the doubling of the daily fine imposed for every day that he continues to turn up at the school where he had worked.
Teacher Enoch Burke was released from prison in December, but a judge doubled a €700-a-day fine previously imposed on him by the High Court for every day that he continues to turn up at Wilson’s Hospital School, the school at which Burke worked before his suspension and subsequent dismissal.
Mr Justice David Nolan also directed that representatives of the Department of Finance and the Attorney General should attend court in January to explain what mechanism can be put in place to collect some €193,000 in fines now owed by him since he first breached the order to stay away from Wilson’s Hospital School in Co Westmeath.
Mr Burke continues to be paid his full salary as a teacher, pending the outcome of an appeal over his sacking, while also costing the State €80,000 a year to keep him in prison, the judge said. He was well into his second year in prison before his release.
The Burke family pronoun controversy began in 2022 when Enoch Burke voiced on several occasions his opposition to a request from the school principal to address a transgender child by a different name and refer to them by the pronoun “they”.
Enoch Burke was subsequently suspended from Wilson’s Hospital School in June 2022. However, after Burke repeatedly showed up on school grounds on several occasions, leading to the school request a High Court injunction to prevent Enoch Burke from visiting the school grounds for the duration of his suspension. The High Court granted the request at the end of August 2022.
On 1 September 2022, Enoch Burke turned up at the school, breaching the High Court order. On 2 September, the High Court ordered the arrest of Burke on contempt of court, after which Enoch Burke was jailed.
On 20 January 2023 following a meeting , Enoch Burke was formally dismissed from his teaching post by Wilson’s Hospital School. Burke turned up at Wilson’s Hospital School on three days shortly after the dismissal.
Enoch Burke being arrested
In March 2023, Ammi, Simeon, Isaac, Sean, Martina, and Enoch were ejected from the High Court by Gardaí due to their disruption when the judge attempted to deliver judgement on Enoch Burke’s appeal against the injunctions granted by the High Court directing him not to trespass at Wilson’s Hospital School. Simeon was remanded in custody for breach of the peace, and later fined €300 upon his conviction.
In August 2023, the first day of the 2023/2024 school year, Enoch Burke again returned to Wilson’s Hospital School to protest his suspension and the order banning him from the school grounds, and was jailed again for breaching the order.
Burke was released from jail in June 2024, but entered the school grounds once again, and was jailed for the third time in September 2024. In October 2024, Burke was jailed once again after refusing to acknowledge the an order by the judge to stay away from Wilson’s Hospital School.
On 20 December 2024, Enoch Burke was freed from Mountjoy Prison, where he was being imprisoned for refusing to comply with High Court orders to stay away from his former place of employment at Wilson’s Hospital School.
He currently owes €193,000 in fines accrued for breaching that order, and will face a larger fine of €1,400 a day if he continues to attend the school when it reconvenes next week.
Enoch Burke leaving the High Court with his parents, father Sean Burke, mother Martina Burke and his sister Ammi
(Image: Collins Courts)
However, Enoch Burke is not the only member of the family to have faced prison.
The father of jailed teacher Enoch Burke was imprisoned for two months in December 2024, after rejecting the chance of a suspended sentence, for attacking a female Garda in the Court of Appeal (CoA).
However, Ammi Burke was cleared of obstructing another male Garda during the same incident. Sean Burke, who is in his 60s, denied assaulting Bridewell Garda Victoria Fisher in the Four Courts on March 7 2023, when his wife Martina was escorted from a hearing for shouting at judges. Garda Fisher was grabbed, knocked down and hit a radiator, resulting in bruising.
Even though he had been spared a criminal record, Burke unsuccessfully attempted to quash the guilty verdict delivered in May in the District Court, which gave him the Probation of Offenders Act. However, following a three-day District Court Appeals hearing, Judge Ronan Munro convicted him at the end of December 2024.
Judge Munro imposed a two-month sentence; however, noting Burke’s lack of prior convictions, he said he would suspend it on condition the accused keep the peace and be of good behaviour for one year. However, Sean Burke, who said he felt demeaned during the hearing, refused to sign the peace bond at which the judge ordered that he would serve the sentence.
Burke, who had represented himself and did not accept the verdict, shook hands with and hugged his son, Dr Isaac Burke, before being led into custody.
Enoch Burke at Wilson’s Hospital School
(Image: Colin Brennan)
However, the family gained some support from a priest who said he was once “outraged” at the disrespect shown for the courts, but now asks “what choice does a citizen have?” when faced with laws they feel are unjust.
Fr Brendan Kilcoyne urged Catholics to “stop laughing” at Enoch Burke and admitted that his sympathy for the sacked schoolteacher had grown, despite originally disapproving of his long-running protest. Fr Brendan questioned whether he had been wrong and Mr Burke had been right, and that he was being taught by the evangelical Christian, who he claimed had “shamed” Catholics with his trenchant stance.
“From the beginning, I felt that Enoch could have dealt differently with the issue in the school; dealt with the principal differently. But he is right. There is a huge problem if you’re teaching [about transgenderism] in a Christian school. There is a huge problem if you are acknowledging alleged gender transformation, gender transition in a Christian school,” said Fr Kilcoyne, who is the parish priest in Balla, Co Mayo.
Fr Kilcoyne said he originally believed that Mr Burke could have framed his objection differently and that his family could have handled the issue differently – particularly when disrespect was shown for the courts. He also felt that Mr Burke should not have continued showing up at his former school in Westmeath but said his sympathy was growing “as a result of his persistent personal witness and the appalling price he’s paying for it”.
“I must acknowledge that, if I am right in this, that I am being taught by him. I must acknowledge that as a matter of honesty,” Fr Kilcoyne added on an episode of his podcast, The Brendan Option.
“I was outraged by his behaviour, the behaviour of his family in court. Now, I’m beginning to wonder that, if they sincerely believe that the courts are applying an unjust law, what choice does a citizen have? I am the most innocuous, harmless little creature you can imagine… but I am seriously beginning to wonder whether I was not wrong and Enoch right – that’s where I am now.”
Fr Kilcoyne said Catholics may have to think more about the issue, and may have to conclude that Mr Burke – who is not a Catholic – has shamed us.
“I am beginning to think I may have been wrong, I don’t question for a second that what [Mr Burke] is highlighting is absolutely wrong. What I questioned was the way in which he was doing it.”
He called on Catholics to “get your schools back”, and suggested that the public was failing to address the issue of transgenderism being taught in classrooms “out of cowardice and laziness”.
“And I’m saying to you, Stop laughing at Enoch, right? Now, I didn’t laugh at him. I was bothered, I was worried, and I was disapproving… it bothered me that he was doing something that many of us didn’t have the courage to do.”
In total, there are ten Burke children with each given a biblical name. There’s Ammi, Elijah, Enoch, Esther, Isaac, Jemima, Josiah, Keren, Kezia, and Simeon. All ten of the Burke children were home-schooled by their mother Martina Burke who is a qualified teacher.
In 2021, Isaac, Kezia, Ammi, and Enoch lost their legal challenge lifetime bans they were given which stopped them from participating in student societies at their college, NUIG.
The NUIG students union held a “referendum about implementing a strategy of boycott, divestment, and sanctions against the state of Israel.” The Burkes who together occupied all four officer positions on the university’s Christian Union Society, used society funds to print leaflets advocating for a “no” vote.”
As a result, the university’s “society co-ordination group” stated that Isaacc, Kezia, Ammi and Enoch were banned as a result of the distribution of the leaflets which bore the college logo, which was against the college’s code of conduct, and furthermore used college funds to pay for the leaflet.”
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