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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2024
The prosperity of theology at Universities in this country is, for better or worse, linked to the prosperity or otherwise of Religious Education in the nation's schools where pupils first learn the grammar and vocabulary of belief. Yet despite one of the aspirations of recent reforms of the subject being to harmonize student transition from secondary to tertiary level, other voices have been raised which question the validity of that project. This article considers why religious education is currently such a contested pedagogical space, what kind of alternatives are being proposed and why Newman's Idea of a University and an ‘inclusive’ understanding of Theology might inform a coherent Catholic response.
1 Newman, J. H., The Idea of a University (Chicago: Loyola, ([1852] 1927), II:1Google Scholar.
3 Ibid., p. 6. The report also notes that the University of Lincoln, Middlesex University, Staffordshire University, Glyndwr University and Anglia Ruskin University all had at least 50 students enrolled in undergraduate programmes in 2012/13 but reported no enrolment in 2017/18.
4 T. Wyatt in The Church Times, 22/8/2019. See https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2019/23-august/news/uk/religious-studies-gcse-continues-to-fall-in-popularity
5 Source Education Datalab where tables show entries have decreased slightly, falling from 17,024 last year to 16,214 https://results.ffteducationdatalab.org.uk/a-level/religious-studies.php?v=20190815
6 The most recent being 27/07/2019 at Notre Dame University's Global Gateway in London.
7 Cf. Towey, A. and Robinson, P., ‘Religious Education Reform in the Catholic Schools of England and Wales’ in Lydon, J. (ed) Contemporary Catholic Education (Leominster: Gracewing, 2018)Google Scholar and with Whittle, S., ‘What is happening to RE in Catholic Schools?’ in The Pastoral Review 12:5, 2016, pp. 52-56Google Scholar.
11 See McGrail, P., Towey, A., ‘Partners in progress? An impact study of the 2016 religious education reforms in England,’ International Studies in Christianity and Education (special issue: Critical Christian intersections between higher education and schools) 2019, pp. 1-21Google Scholar.
12 As a member of the recent Commission on Religious Education, I was privy to over a thousand detailed survey responses from teachers regarding RE. The desire for greater academic credibility was unanimous.
13 See P. McGrail, A. Towey (2019) Op. cit.
15 See ‘Critique and counter-critique of Understanding Christianity’ http://www.torbay.gov.uk/media/8385/appendix-3-re_today_course_understanding_christianity_humanist_objectionsdh.docx
16 See for example the stance of the ‘Accord Coalition’ http://accordcoalition.org.uk/
17 Congregation for Catholic Education (05/05/2009) Circular letter to the presidents of Bishops' conferences on Religious Education in schools http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccatheduc/documents/rc_con_ccatheduc_doc_20090505_circ-insegn-relig_en.html
18 A. Brine, 2015 Nov 27. “Wresting Control from the Big Beasts.” RE:Online. http://www.reonline.org.uk/news/alans-blogwresting-control-from-the-big-beasts-alan-brine/
19 See Clayton, M. et al., (2018) “How to regulate faith schools,” Impact: Philosophical Perspectives on Education Policy 25Google Scholar (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/2048-416X.2018.12005.x).
20 Commission on Religious Education (2018) Final Report: Religion and Worldviews: The Way forward Available at https://www.commissiononre.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Final-Report-of-the-Commission-on-RE.pdf
21 Wintersgill, B., Big Ideas for Religious Education (Exeter: University of Exeter, 2017)Google Scholar.
22 During consultations for the Commission on Religious Education 2016-18, when I suggested that Big Ideas was pedagogically contrary to the DfE 2016 R.E. Reform, B. Wintersgill replied ‘Hell Yes!’ (31/03/17).
23 See Dinham, A. & Shaw, M., RE for Real: The Future of Teaching and Learning about Religion and Belief (London: Goldsmiths, 2015)Google Scholar.
24 Commission on Religious Education Final Report, 2018, p. 75.
25 Cf. NATRE (National Association of Teachers of RE) ‘NATRE are pleased to see in this report something that will promote conversation about religions and worldviews and wider society. We hope that the government will consider these recommendations seriously. https://www.natre.org.uk/news/latest-news/extended-natre-response-to-the-commission-report/ with the Catholic Education Service: “Any attempt to improve the quality of RE in all schools must be applauded and we are committed to working with the RE community to achieve this. However, this report is not so much an attempt to improve RE as to fundamentally change its character. The proposed name change to include ‘worldviews’ means that the scope of the subject is now so wide and nondescript that it would potentially lose all academic value and integrity. As we have always maintained, the quality of Religious Education is not improved by teaching less religion.” https://www.catholiceducation.org.uk/component/k2/item/1003658-catholic-education-service-response-to-the-commission-on-religious-education-report - NB Tory government/ Welsh Assembly
26 E.g. Consulted on 02/09/19, Duncan MacPherson after a lifetime of working at tertiary level in Religious Studies wryly applauded its comprehensive nature – “as a Master's course”. Professor of Education, John Sullivan, likewise admired the breadth of its horizon but noted that “in trying to distance itself from any particular perspective, it risks being merely distant”.
27 E.g. Prof.Cooling, Trevor of Canterbury Christ Church International Journal of Christian Education, 2019, Vol. 23(1) 3-9Google Scholar and https://blogs.canterbury.ac.uk/nicer/what-future-for-religious-education-in-schools/
28 Hannam, P., & Biesta, G., ‘Religious education, a matter of understanding? Reflections on the final report of the Commission on Religious Education’ in Journal of Beliefs & Values, 2019, 40:1, pp. 55-63CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
29 Ibid., p. 58: “Indeed, promoting care and respect may also be a laudable aim, but our point is that there is no automatic connection from the one to the other. This is also because enhanced understanding can lead to the opposite: to disrespect, hate, and so on. Terrorists, to make the point one more time, tend to have a very good understanding of other people's world views; that is to say they have made their own meaning from such world views.”
30 Ibid., p. 59. One is reminded of the definition of theology as interruption.
31 Barnes, L., ‘What is Wrong with the Phenomenological Approach to Religious Education’. Religious Education. 2001, 96. Pp. 445-461CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
32 As is the case e.g. in Sweden. Cf. for further international comparison Toledo guiding principles on teaching about religions and beliefs in Public schools. https://www.osce.org/odihr/29154?download=true
33 Boeve, L., Theology at the crossroads of university, Church and society: Dialogue, difference and Catholic identity (T & T Clark, London, 2016) pp. 174-199CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
34 Personal feelings of relevance are emphatically not the arbiter of curricula in other subjects. Moreover, it is also worth noting that the risks of pupil ‘cognitive overload’ whereby the worldviews of an individual have an equivalence vis a vis a globally significant worldviews with traction for billions of adherents seems an obvious danger in a modern learning environment.
35 https://www.reonline.org.uk/blog/whats-the-next-step-on-the-way-forward-dr-richard-kueh/Kueh R (2018) cf, Kueh, R., ‘Religious education and the knowledge problem’. In: Chater, M. and Castelli, M. (eds) We Need to Talk About Religious Education: Manifestos for the Future of RE. London: Jessica Kingsley, pp. 53-69Google Scholar.
36 In the list of ancillary disciplines that may assist in the study of worldviews it is perhaps no accident that theology appears last- Commission on RE Final Report, p. 38.
37 Cf. John Paul II Pastores dabo vobis, 1992, §§52 & 53 available at http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_exhortations/documents/hf_jp-ii_exh_25031992_pastores-dabo-vobis.html
38 Theology: We have called this thinking through believing. It is about asking questions that believers would ask. It requires pupils to think like theologians, or to look through a theological lens at concepts. Philosophy: We have called this thinking through thinking. It is about asking questions that thinkers would ask. It requires pupils to think like philosophers, or to look through a philosophical lens at concepts. Human/Social Sciences: We have called this thinking through living. It is about asking questions that people who study lived reality or phenomena would ask. It requires pupils to think like human and social scientists, or to look through a human/social science lens at concepts.https://www.dioceseofnorwich.org/schools/siams-re-collective-worship/religious-education/age-related-expectations
39 Rahner, K., Foundations of Christian Faith (New York: Crossroad, 1984) p. 22Google Scholar.
40 Walsh, P., ‘From philosophy to theology of Catholic education, with Bernard Lonergan and Karl Rahner’ International Studies in Catholic Education, 2018, 10:2, p. 142CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
41 Rahner, Foundations p. 23.
42 Whittle, S., A Theory of Catholic Education (London: Bloomsbury, 2015)Google Scholar.
43 Carmody, B., ‘The Catholic School: non-Confessional?’ in International Studies in Catholic Education, 2017, 9:2, pp. 162-175CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Carmody, B., ‘Ecclesial to Public Space: Religion in Irish Secondary Schools’ in Religious Education, 2019, 114:5, pp. 551-564CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
44 Lonergan, B., Method in Theology (London: DLT, 1973) p. 103Google Scholar.
45 Ibid., p. 238.
46 B. Carmody, Catholic School pp. 165 & 169.
47 Cf. The Birmingham Agreed Syllabus https://servicesforeducation.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Birmingham_Agreed_Syllabus_for_Religious_Education_2007.pdf and the work of the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues based at Birmingham University https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/research/activity/education/jubilee-centre/index.aspx
48 E.g. Bowie, R., & Coles, R., ‘We reap what we sow: perpetuating biblical illiteracy in new English Religious Studies exams and the proof text binary question’ in British Journal of Religious Education, 2018, 40:3, pp. 277-287CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
49 ‘The Case for the Catholic Approach to Religious Education’ in The Catholic Times 06/07/19.
50 See Towey, A., (2018) Introduction to Christian Theology (2nd Edn.) (London: Bloomsbury, 2018)Google Scholar.
51 Interviewed at Conference 05/09/19.
52 Newman Idea II.5.
53 Newman, Idea II:3
54 Ibid.
55 Ibid., II.9.
