Why is religion still a school subject?

Jacks Smirking Revenge

I apologize if this has been a thread before, but as someone currently going through secondary school, I have to get something off my chest.

I personally think its fucking ridiculous that its still being thought as a Junior/Leaving Cert subject. My insanely religious teacher didn't help last year either. With the "God is real and if you don't believe that you're going to Hell!" mentality that she had.

I wouldn't have problem with it if it wasn't compulsory in most Irish schools!

Sarky

Well, when 98% of the schools are run by the Roman Catholic Church, you're going to have problems like this. It's why a lot of people campaign against it. You should join in.

tvnutz

I teach Religion, yet I am not religious. What I actually I believe, I am not really sure. I tell the students this, I never force beliefs on them, I tell them faith is something they will choose, and that may change as they got older and it may change on their life experiences. The parents at parent teacher meetings were very positive towards this. Your teacher sounds like an idiot, I hate RE teachers like that.

I personally believe it is important to learn about something that has such a massive impact on this planet,whether that impact be positive or negative. Regardless of whether you have any interest in religion from a belief point of view, it is a subject that has absorbed people's interest from the beginning of time. It has been one of the greatest contributors to civilisation, culture, ethics, politics ,morals, art, war, literature, music, justice and injustice, humanity and inhumanity, social structure, , education, the domination and subjugation of people, the list is endless. And that is before you even start on each different religion and their belief systems.

With my Senior classes it is all very relaxed, no work piled on them,they find a lot of it interesting. Had great discussions on Abortion and Euthanasia with the recent cases. Other ethical and moral issues such as the Death Penalty, using torture, issues of war and peace, my 6th years are loving Cults I am doing at the moment. My 1st years found Islam interesting because they knew nothing about it, doing Human Nature with 2nd years, Lord of the Flies discussion etc.

I don't practice, I have many problems with the Church and organised Religion, yet many teens have questions, some have suffered loss and seek to explain it, etc etc, so many things going through a teen's mind, they way I teach it and how I think it should be taught, I think it is important. As for saying i takes up classes for other subjects, many students would actually say it is a good class to take a break from the stresses of an exam year and that they enjoy discussing these different topics. I can see exactly where you are coming from, but I disagree. This is also coming from the guy who's main subject is History and I much prefer it, teaching RE can be a handful, but I think it has its importance.

Sarky

Sounds like you've been treading a dangerous path tvnutz. Does the school board have a priest on it? Does he know you're letting kids think for themselves? I hope not. It sounds like you're doing a fair job at making religion interesting instead of the indoctrination the church tends to like. In my day, RE teachers like that just didn't exist.

Chemical Burn

tylercheribini

Having Catholicism rammed down my throat through the education system during my formative years has made me hate it more than ever. This all to the backdrop of what seemed like weekly to monthly church abuse scandals in the media. The attempted brainwashing failed as it did with the vast majority of my friends of the same schools who are intelligent, free thinking people. I agree, it is a complete waste of school time and resources, which im sure could be put to better use as we see our school literary and maths skills standards in general dropping.

I didn't have religion in secondary, thankfully

tylercheribini

i went to a christian brothers school so it was ramped up a notch then.triple religion some years and detention for anyone who skipped class mass

jobeenfitz

They should provide religious books in schools for anyone who is interested, during free classes or in their own time. These books should be kept in the fiction section.

Chemical Burn

tylercheribini wrote: »

i went to a christian brothers school so it was ramped up a notch then.triple religion some years and detention for anyone who skipped class mass

We did 1 hour of religion per day in Primary school and NO science .. EVER.

We had 3 hours of religion in secondary school and 5 hours of science and 5 hours of maths ... shows you the priorities

Fattes

Because we live in a backward banana republic that requires old age pensioners to vote so nobody touches the religious issues. Instead of teaching our children languages and science, we teach them fairytales.

tvnutz

Sarky wrote: »

Sounds like you've been treading a dangerous path tvnutz. Does the school board have a priest on it? Does he know you're letting kids think for themselves? I hope not. It sounds like you're doing a fair job at making religion interesting instead of the indoctrination the church tends to like. In my day, RE teachers like that just didn't exist.

Ye the board has a priest I believe, but its a community school, so its not overly religious. I hated it when I was in school, Catholic dogma shoved down your throat, I wouldn't teach it if it was the same way it used to be. The curriculum has its faults but it has changed since I was in school to cover a lot more broader topics, world religions, morality and ethics, science and religion, atheism,agnosticism,humanism etc. It is still very Christian leaning but since it is non-exam in my school I can play around it with a lot. Like with 3rd years I do more citizenship style topics,like in the UK, such as Child labour, child soldiers, genocide etc, which I can tie into the morality section.

TheOldHand

When I think of all the hours of schooling I had and then all the hours spent in religion class. Insane. I left school never once being thought how a mortgage works. It didn't matter to me but I can think of a few hundred thousand of people that it might have helped.

wolfpawnat

Surely religion should be taught like every other subject?

An elective one of course and the students could learn all major world religions on an equal level. The beliefs and customs associated with each ones. Islam, Christianity (it's sub categories), Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, etc. I would have loved to have learnt it like this in school. Faith means a lot to so many people, (not me personally, but to others it does) and since so many kids in schools these days are of so varied backgrounds, I would think education would for the most part breed greater understanding, as opposed to ignorance.

eviltwin

Religion could be covered under the SPHE course freeing more time for the important subjects or more practical things like money management or PE

darjeeling

Teach the controversy! :pac:

But seriously, religion is very important in human history and culture, so I'm all in favour of teaching children about religion. I'm not in favour of telling them that any one religion is true, at least not in a state-funded education system.

My own RE experiences were pretty woeful. We learned lots of superficial trivia about the foods, clothing and architecture of all the world religions, but not very much about the ideas or history. Lacking interest, I dropped the subject at 15, along - I'm almost certain - with everyone else in the school.

Over the years since then I've spent quite a bit of time learning about religions, and have thought from time to time how much better it could have been taught.

Bannasidhe

One of the topics I lecture on to 3rd level students is the Reformation and pretty quickly it became obvious that in order for me to be able to discuss Luther's 95 Theses and what exactly he was objecting to and why this was so bloody important- without going into the theology just a simple Luther said 'this, this and this' while Rome said 'that, that and that' - I would first have to explain to the Catholics things like Transubstantiation, Indulgences, etc etc.
All those years of 'religious education' and they don't understand the basic tenets of their professed religion -never mind anyone else's- so lack the wherewithal to understand what sparked this incredibly important turning point in history.

I do think religion should be taught in schools but at no point should anyone be told that a specific religious belief is the correct one, or that having a religious belief is even required. As others have said, people should be educated about the tenets of the different religions and allowed to make up their own minds.

It would also be most excellent if people were educated about our political system so I don't have to keep explaining it every bloody time there is an election or a referendum...:(

tylercheribini

when i was in secondary school we had our history teacher telling us how the vatican state came about through a deal with the devil(mussolini) and then our religion "teacher" saying it simply wasnt true haha

Kinski

tylercheribini wrote: »

when i was in secondary school we had our history teacher telling us how the vatican state came about through a deal with the devil(mussolini) and then our religion "teacher" saying it simply wasnt true haha

Why else would the pope wear that "I made a deal with the devil and all I got was this stupid city-state" t-shirt?

Eramen

I think people aren't looking at this through the right lens.

The whole public school system is a failure when looking at it from a stand-point of educating the populace, whether in humanities, science, language, practical exercises and personal self-betterment.

It certainly doesn't encourage life-long learning. It chronically turns out people who can barely read, who can't understand, form and express ideas, initiate creative enterprise, keep themselves physically healthy or carry out basic arithmetic.

90% of your public education is forgotten by the time you're 25, if not before, because it's worthless. Education is meant to prepare you for life, initiate you into a culture, bring you to a state of enlightenment where you can associate with other people on many levels, not just socially.

It's time for this state-sponsored intellectual crisis to be scraped. It matters little if religion is left in or taken out, the core program of the way children and adults are instructed remains the same, as does the lack of teaching credentials by a percentage of tutors -> which are the problems.

In most other continents of the world private education especially, or home-schooling is the norm. It's cheap, convenient and successful at its primary aims in most terms. Students and schools can come to agreement about educational goals and outlines, about which direction they want to take, and this is its beauty. For ex. if you are bad at maths, you need only do the basic math curriculum, and this frees time/effort so that you can focus much more of your energy into subjects that you really know will be helpful to you in your life ambitions - and get rewarded for this. It reduces waste. It's an innovation powered mode of teaching where parents, teachers and students are in control, not the government.

Yet here we are arguing about religion being taught in schools without a care for the methodology, approach or purpose of the education our kids receive in all modules and subjects. If we try to understand the situation by 'problem identification' we have failed utterly. Most people here have given political statements of why a subject should not be taught in school with regard for educational analysis.

Taking religion out or leaving it in will not correct the fundamental problem, will not change the result.. welcome to AA.

Nodin

Eramen wrote: »

........

In most other continents of the world private education especially, or home-schooling is the norm........

Examples, please.

yohan the great

TheOldHand wrote: »

When I think of all the hours of schooling I had and then all the hours spent in religion class. Insane. I left school never once being thought how a mortgage works. It didn't matter to me but I can think of a few hundred thousand of people that it might have helped.

If you did business you would know what a mortgage is

Vito Corleone

The following is a list of what we did in our religion class. (two 35 minute classes per week)

-Got information sheets about contraceptives and sexual heath etc..
-Talked about if there was a God or not
-Talked about suicide/depression
-Talked about sexuality
-Talked about bullying
-Learned about different cults
-Discussed abortion
-Watched movies
-Organised the school grad
-Did nothing
-Skipped class and went to the pub or study hall

As you can see it wasn't really a religion class, and was actually quite beneficial in some ways and a nice break from proper work. I don't know what the set up is in other schools but I really think that the class should be focused on talking about depression, sex, abortion and other issues that affect young people. The class should also be renamed something more appropriate.

darjeeling

Eramen wrote: »

I think people aren't looking at this through the right lens.

The whole public school system is a failure when looking at it from a stand-point of educating the populace, whether in humanities, science, language, practical exercises and personal self-betterment. [...]

The thread is about whether studying religion has any place in education. I think that's an interesting question, particularly for people who are non-religious or secularly-minded. Your post raises questions about quality of education in relation to choice and flexibility in the school system and curriculum. I see this as a separate issue, and not one where religious belief has any special relevance.

zenno

Jacks smirking revenge I personally think its fucking ridiculous that its still being thought as a Junior/Leaving Cert subject.

Now that's interesting as I thought religion was removed and gone a long time ago from these Cert subjects. It's amazing that the church still has it's devilish hands on education to such extent.

Seriously, what will religion teach anyone...(nothing in this world) You either believe or you don't. Remove it and put a better subject in there to enhance the brain and rewards other than mind-molding a pupils brain into a draconian belief system.

kylith

How long has it been an exam subject? There wasn't a sniff of that when I did my leaving 12 years ago. Even if it had I'd probably just have either written 'Cult' all over the sheet, or Jimmy Carr's "literally never happened".

tylercheribini

Vito Corleone wrote: »

The following is a list of what we did in our religion class. (two 35 minute classes per week)

-Got information sheets about contraceptives and sexual heath etc..
-Talked about if there was a God or not
-Talked about suicide/depression
-Talked about sexuality
-Talked about bullying
-Learned about different cults
-Discussed abortion
-Watched movies
-Organised the school grad
-Did nothing
-Skipped class and went to the pub or study hall

As you can see it wasn't really a religion class, and was actually quite beneficial in some ways and a nice break from proper work. I don't know what the set up is in other schools but I really think that the class should be focused on talking about depression, sex, abortion and other issues that affect young people. The class should also be renamed something more appropriate.

sounds interesting alright. our teacher/class could not have been more dogmatic. straight from the old school except he wasnt even that old,only in his late 40's.was sad really to see someone that brainwashed.nothing could be questioned in his class and everything in the bible was fact. of course this left him open to be wound up to the last by various class members. I have to say I have not laughed as hard before or since that much whilst in that class.pure comedy gold

Eramen

darjeeling wrote: »

The thread is about whether studying religion has any place in education...

If we understand what 'education' means, then yes, we know it must in educational and human terms have a place in most school systems.


Your average political 'atheist' has used this thread to unload their baggage at the door of education, without little understanding of why they are doing this, and this is why this thread fails.

JRant

It should most definitely be scrapped from the curriculum. If schools want to teach it let them but in no way should the state be setting exams and legitimizing it.

Those hours of school time would be much better spent teaching ethics and critical thinking to students.

zenno

Eramen wrote: »

If we understand what 'education' means, then yes, we know it must in educational and human terms have a place in most school systems.


Your average political 'atheist' has used this thread to unload their baggage at the door of education, without little understanding of why they are doing this, and this is why this thread fails.

The thread doesn't fail...it is simply a valid question with regards to real life learning prospects than the oldness of fairy tales, hence, religion/dogma being forced onto pupils.

Education is important obviously, but religion as an exam/test is plain forced brain-washing and should have no place in any Irish educational system. It's time to move forward and leave the old outdated lies and dogma behind.

Nodin

Eramen wrote: »

If we understand what 'education' means, then yes, we know it must in educational and human terms have a place in most school systems.


Your average political 'atheist' has used this thread to unload their baggage at the door of education, without little understanding of why they are doing this, and this is why this thread fails.

You might get back to me re
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=83579552&postcount=21