Religious education
Important orientation in a diverse society
As they grow up, children, young people and schoolchildren are repeatedly and intensely confronted with questions of religion and their own religiosity. The growing religious pluralism and the increase in religion-related conflicts show how important it is to preserve religious education in the form of religious instruction in civil schools.
Due to the history of their own development and their cultural influence, the churches wish to contribute to a modern form of religious education that fosters the person. To this end, they offer competent cooperation in matters concerning state educational policy.
Religious education raises a variety of pedagogical, social, religious and theological questions. It is an important part of the educational culture of every school that sees itself as an educationally just and non-violent space for exchange and understanding in a diverse society.
With the current ‘Curriculum 21’, which is being adopted in an increasing number of cantons, religious education is being integrated into a didactics that spans an entire subject area. Here ‘Ethics, Religions, Community’ forms part of the subject area ‘Nature, the Person, Society’. The churches fear a gradual decline in religious topics in schools, and are therefore calling for the preservation or creation of a separate subject area.