It’s little wonder that it’s taken more than a decade to arrive at a draft policy on the place of religion in education. So prickly and emotive is this realm of human experience that the final policy will only be publicly released next month.
The policy-makers need to be congratulated on the sensitivity they have shown to all the major religious groupings in South Africa and the positive way forward they have negotiated. Religious instruction will be the responsibility of the family and
community; religious observances will have a qualified space at schools; and the core duty of education will be to provide a rounded knowledge of the range of faiths — as well as the world-views of the faithless.
The central values this approach is expressing are those close to our young democracy’s heart: the rights of freedom from discrimination and freedom of conscience, religion, thought, belief and opinion; and the nurturing of tolerance and equality towards difference.
There are many shared values and views on morality between the faiths that make for a powerful universal message on humanity and the parameters of acceptable behaviour. And then, of course, there’s the wealth of historical and mythical characters that can only add to the bounty of our youths’ imaginations.
In short, the material for religion education is nothing short of astonishing.
There is another dimension to religion education, though, that must be considered. According to the draft policy, learners will be taught in a spirit of tolerance about religions whose followers so often express grotesque intolerance towards those who believe differently. They will be expected to understand with a sense of openness and equality systems of belief that themselves validate horrendous oppression and prejudices, whether it’s against women or infidels.
The draft policy emphasises the role of religion education in developing transferable skills such as reading comprehension, disciplined imagination (er, what’s that exactly?) and critical thinking.
There are major ingredients missing, though, that are crucial if this recipe is to work — the usual ones, like the buy-in from teachers and additional training, the right textbooks and materials. But what a magnificent outcome it would be if, in the course of looking at the history, dogma and principles of various religions, the critically thinking learner took these institutionalised faiths to task for their many dark and ambiguous aspects. After all, as young people due to inherit society, this learning process may just make for a generation that is intolerant of intolerance and who may see a way to make diversity a source of unity.
Perhaps, too, in the process of dividing information about religion from its practice, an outlook will evolve that sees the powerful and very earthly institutions of religion as one thing and spirituality as another. For there is a train of thought that has travelled steadily through the ages that shouldn’t be easily dismissed: we needn’t look only to the preachers of religion and their places of worship to access the superhuman power that controls existence and beyond. These may be where we find cultural belonging and a valuable sense of community.
But to find the gods, we can look within ourselves.