Teaching religion has been a part of American education since the colonial era, when theological documents like the New England Primer both taught students to read and indoctrinated them into the Christian faith (Johnson, et. al., 2008). The forward-thinking framers of the Constitution, however, recognized that this could lead to the same government-enforced religious monopoly that they had left and battled England to escape. Thus, the Establishment Clause, which states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” Most people refer to this clause when they use the slightly pithier phrase “separation of church and state”. In the latter half of the 20th century, this has popularly been interpreted as the need to completely extract any trace of religion from anything publicly funded, especially schools. However, another slightly smaller camp argues that religion can be a part of publicly-funded institutions as long as one religion is not promoted over all the others. I argue that religion has been and continues to be part of the fabric of our society. The traditions and thought patterns of religions have shaped our world, and understanding them is essential to being a responsible citizen of the United States and the global community. Thus, religion can and should be taught in schools under certain guidelines. The Establishment Clause has been interpreted as a need to set up a wall between the sacred and the secular, but a wall leaves us blind while protecting us. Rather, it should be thought of as a fence, where religion and government cannot harm each other, but they can certainly see what the other is doing.
Legal Precedents: Can Religion Be Taught In School?
There are certain plenty of unconstitutional uses of religion in public schools, among them school-mandated prayer and teaching Creationism or Intelligent Design, as well as contested issues such as student distribution of religious publications, religious organizations meeting after-school, and showing religious movies (Johnson, et. al., 2008). Generally, these legal conflicts of religion and education have been judged by the Lemon Test, composed of three questions:
• Does the act have a secular purpose?
• Does the primary effect of the act either advance or inhibit religion?
• Does the act avoid excessive entanglement of government and religion?
An answer of no to any of these questions makes the act unconstitutional. Unfortunately, “excessive entanglement” is a rather vague notion. Many Supreme Court Justices find the Lemon Test to be dissatisfying. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor has proposed a popular alternative asking whether a governmental act endorses religion. A more conservative group supports a test developed by Justice Anthony Kennedy, which asks if the act coerces people to support or participate in a religion against their will (Haynes & Thomas, 2001). Teaching religion, when following the guidelines that will be outlined later on, passes all of these tests.
Indeed, it was established almost 50 years ago that teaching in public schools is constitutional. As part of the Supreme Court’s ruling on school prayer in Abington v. Schemp, Associate Justice Tom Clark wrote:
It might well be said that one’s education is not complete without a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization. It certainly may be said that the Bible is worthy of study for its literary and historic qualities. Nothing we have said here indicates that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistently with the First Amendment. (Haynes & Thomas, 2001)
This is the legal keystone for why and how religion should be taught in public schools. What is first and foremost, however, is that it can be perfectly legal to do so. The Modesto, California Public School District exercised this constitutional right in 2000, when they established a required course in World Religions and Religious Liberty for incoming 9th grade students (Johnson, et. al., 2008). So religion can be taught in school, but should it be?
The Community of Voices and the History of Ideas:
Why Should Religion Be Taught in School?
Educational philosopher Maxine Greene notes that today “we are challenged as never before to confront plurality and multiplicity” (1993). Immigration, globalization, civil rights movements, and the genocides of the 20th century have greatly increased awareness of not only the number of different voices in the nation and the world, but also their right to be heard and the value of hearing them. It is important that various communities have an understanding of what each group is all about, to shatter misconceptions, if not develop empathy. It is, after all, misconceptions and a lack of empathy that paves the way for lynching and genocide. To establish John Dewey’s vision of democracy, “a way of living together in which mutual and free consultation rule instead of force,” (1937), we must be willing to learn about each other’s point of view. What has a greater influence on the point of view of millions than religion? In addition, a “community of voices” (Greene, 1993) must be able to speak and understand each other’s discourses. Even within the English language, there are myriad vocabularies, dialects, grammars, and religious language certainly accounts for some of that discourse. To be able to speak and understand these multiple discourses or “code-switch” (Swords and Wheeler, 2006) will make people more versatile and able to function effectively in a diverse world. Teaching religion will allow students to understand the stories, histories, vocabularies, and worldviews that influence their community, their nation, and the world.
Objectivity: How Should Religion Be Taught in School?
Having determined that religion can be taught and why it should be taught, the time is right for explaining how it should be taught. After all, the danger of teaching religion is that the teacher may try promote one religion, denigrate another, and/or make religious truth claims about the world. However, it is very possible to teach religion without doing so. A coalition of 17 major religious and educational organizations released a study that points out what distinguishes teaching about religion versus the teaching of religion (indoctrination):
• The school’s approach to religion is academic, not devotional.
• The school strives for student awareness of religions, but does not press for student acceptance of any religion.
• The school sponsors study about religion, not the practice of religion.
• The school may expose students to a diversity of religious views, but may not impose any particular view. (Haynes & Thomas, 2001)
A teacher may say that a certain religious group believes this or that, that a historical event influenced this or that religion, that this text is important for this or that religion. The difference is that (generally) a teacher should not state that a religious claim is categorically true or untrue. This objectivity will help someone teaching about religion to avoid offending students/parents and bringing legal trouble upon themselves.
I have a great deal of interest in teaching both about religion and about religious texts. I think religious vocabulary, history, and iconography so heavily effect media of all types that to not teach it would be leaving a huge blind spot on the cultural lens of my students. In addition, I think religious texts have quite a bit of literary merit outside of the truth claims they make, and analyzing them in that fashion can sharpen their skills as readers and storytellers. Finally, the big questions that religion and religious texts attempt to answer are questions I want my students to ask and to come up with their own answers, and discussing religion is a good way to get them thinking about those questions. Last year, I only used a few creation myths during my mythology unit. Next year, I plan to incorporate modern religions more into my curriculum. It’s nice to know that the Constitution provides me the protection to do so.
References
Dewey, J. (1937). “Education and social change.” In F. Schultz (Ed.), S.O.U.R.C.E.S.: Notable
selections in education (3rd ed., pp. 333-341). Guillford: McGraw-Hill.
Greene, M. (1993). “The passions of pluralism: Multiculturalism and the expanding
community.” In F. Schultz (Ed.), S.O.U.R.C.E.S.: Notable selections in education (3rd ed., pp. 350-361). Guillford: McGraw-Hill.
Haynes, C.C. & Thomas, O. (2001). Finding common ground: A guide to religious liberty in
public schools. Nashville: First Amendment Center.
Johnson, J. A., Musial, D., Hall, G. E., Gollink, D. M., & Dupuis, V. L. (2005). Introduction to
the foundations of American education. 14th ed. Boston: Pearson Education.
Wheeler, R. and Swords, R. (2006). Code-switching: Teaching standard English in urban
classrooms. Urbana: NCTE
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