Gabriella,
Ah yes – thank you for reminding me of the document and of your penchant for selective quoting. Sadly for you though the same document also says variously stuff like:
“The primary purpose of Catholic Religious Education is to come to know and understand God’s revelation which is fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. The Catholic school is ‘a clear educational project of which Christ is the foundation.’ 6 In the person of Christ, the deepest meaning of what it is to be human — that we are created by God and through the Holy Spirit united with Christ in his Incarnation — is discovered. 7 This revelation is known through the scriptures and the tradition of the Church as taught by the Magisterium.”
“…thus the Gospel will impregnate the mentality of the students in the field of their learning, and the harmonization of their culture will be achieved in the light of faith.”
“It is necessary, therefore, that Religious Education in schools be regarded as an academic discipline with the same systematic demands and the same rigour as other disciplines. It must present the Christian message and the Christian event with the same seriousness and the same depth with which other disciplines present their knowledge. However, it should not simply be regarded as one subject among many, but should be the key element in an inter-disciplinary dialogue. The presentation of the Christian message influences the way in which, for example, the origins of the world, the sense of history, the basis of ethical values, the function of religion in culture, the destiny of the human person, and our relationship with nature, are understood. Religious Education in schools underpins, activates, develops and completes the educational and catechetical activity of the whole school.”
“Though we can know God with certainty by natural reason, there is another order of knowledge: the order of divine Revelation. Through grace, God has revealed himself and given himself to human beings. This he does by revealing the mystery, his plan of loving goodness, formed from all eternity in Christ, for the benefit of all people. God has fully revealed this plan by sending us his beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.”
“Creation is the action of the Trinity, the first step towards the covenant relationship God seeks with all of humanity. Pupils are taught that each human person is created in the image of God and called by grace to a covenant relationship with God and responsibility for stewardship of God’s creation. The Father, through the Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit constantly draws each of us to this mystery, seeking a free and personal response. Pupils come to realise that human nature is challenged in the struggle to choose God alone above all other temptations.”
“Pupils are offered knowledge and understanding of God’s Self-Revelation and the covenant-relationship as the way to reach their fullness in Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God. He is truly God and truly human. In him the entire revelation of the most high God is summed up. His life, death and resurrection are the core events of human history and the heart of our faith. His cross is the ultimate sacrifice for each of us. Jesus reveals the truth and love of God through himself; truly human, truly God. Jesus is presented to our pupils as the perfect response to God through his own intimate communion with his Father.”
“God’s Self-Revelation is made perfect in us by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth. This truth was promised by Jesus and revealed at Pentecost. Through the Holy Spirit people are formed and guided to become God’s people through knowing God. Our pupils are invited to enter into a communion with God through Jesus Christ.”
“To be a Catholic is to be a member of the one true Church of Christ. While elements of truth can be found in other churches and religions, the fullness of the means of salvation subsists in the Catholic Church.”
Sorry for the delay in responding - unlike you, however, if I say I will respond later, I don't just conveniently duck the issue and fail to respond.
Not sure why you felt the need to copy and paste such large chunks about how they propose to teach the Catholic faith in RE lesson instead of referencing page numbers and paragraphs, since it doesn't change the fact that what is being taught are "faith beliefs" unless of course you have evidence that they are claiming to have objective evidence to prove their beliefs are fact. It made your post unnecessarily long, which just means it makes my post long in response.
Your interpretations of the bits you have copied and pasted are no doubt true for you and you sincerely believe your interpretations are correct - my response is the same as last time we had this discussion on the Sweden's schools thread. See below a quick recap of my views on that thread:
I think it's pretty clear in this country that these are faith beliefs, theology, philosophy and not scientific facts, but how it is taught would depend on the school. If there is evidence of a school teaching faith beliefs as facts (i.e. that they are backed by science) I doubt this could be kept secret. There would be reports on it and the state can intervene where necessary.
The document says:
The content of Religious Education will help the pupil to make a critique of all other knowledge, leading, for example, to an understanding of the relationship between science and religion or history, and between theology, sport and the human body.
Pope Benedict XVI, speaking to religious educators, stressed the need to enlarge the area of our rationality, to reopen it to the larger questions of the truth and the good, and to link theology, philosophy and science. The religious dimension contributes to the overall formation of the person and makes it possible to transform knowledge into wisdom of life.
Page 7
The aims of Religious Education:
1 To present engagingly a comprehensive content which is the basis of knowledge and understanding
of the Catholic faith;
2 To enable pupils continually to deepen their religious and theological understanding and be
able to communicate this effectively;
3 To present an authentic vision of the Church’s moral and social teaching so that pupils can
make a critique of the underlying trends in contemporary culture and society;
4 To raise pupils’ awareness of the faith and traditions of other religious communities in order
to respect and understand them;
5 To develop the critical faculties of pupils so that they can relate their Catholic faith to daily
life;
6 To stimulate pupils’ imagination and provoke a desire for personal meaning as revealed in the
truth of the Catholic faith;
7 To enable pupils to relate the knowledge gained through Religious Education to their understanding
of other subjects in the curriculum;
8 To bring clarity to the relationship between faith and life, and between faith and culture.
The outcome of excellent Religious Education is religiously literate and engaged young people who have the knowledge, understanding and skills – appropriate to their age and capacity – to reflect spiritually, and think ethically and theologically, and who are aware of the demands of religious commitment in everyday life.
Notice anything there? How about the absence of a “but this stuff is just our faith” in favour of “true”, “truth”, “truly”, “certain”, “knowledge”, “impregnate the mentality” (such a revealing phrase!), “present the Christian message and the Christian event with the same seriousness and the same depth with which other disciplines present their knowledge”, "Pupils are taught that each human person is created in the image of God and called by grace to a covenant relationship with God and responsibility for stewardship of God’s creation", “creation is….”, “made perfect”, “one true Church” etc?
Hmmm…
I don't see a problem with trying to present a religious message with the same seriousness...depth...other disciplines etc" Aspiring to seriousness and depth seems more useful than aspiring to irreverence or superficiality in lessons. Also, what's your problem with "natural reason" for example? It's a philosophical idea that incorporates God - not surprising in the context of faith beliefs.
Yes, what I notice is that people don't express themselves in the way that you demand they should. Surely you are used to that by now, given how often it happens, and given how often people ignore your attempts to change the way they express themselves. Lots of people read those statements and interpret them as expressions of faith e.g. in relation to concepts such as human purpose and meaning. When I have conversations with people about religious or moral beliefs, or even public policy (e.g about the sanctity of life) I don't need the other person to keep prefacing their statements with "but this stuff is just my belief". It's a given in the context of religion and morals that we're all talking about beliefs. It's pretty simple to ask someone for objective evidence if they claim their beliefs are fact - and given the variety of beliefs, theists as well as atheists often do ask for objective evidence if someone is being insistent that their particular religious interpretation or moral belief is true.
So again you seem to think you know that Alan is using words in some way other than their everyday meaning? They’re not even “philosophical” words either – “real”, “exists” etc mean what they commonly mean. For him, a “soul” is every bit as real as the Eiffel tower is real to you – more so in fact because he refuses to accept even the possibility that he could be wrong about that. Ask him – he’ll tell you so himself if you do.
“Out there” just means “not mind created” – and it’s exactly what he thinks a “soul” to be. He‘s said so so many times there’s no reason to think he actually means something else however much you try to guess that he does.
I just explained all this to you and you dismissed it with a “that’s all very interesting but….”. Again, for him a “soul” is every bit as real as the Eiffel tower is to both of you. He’s as bemused at your inability to agree with him about “soul” as you would be if you took him to Paris and he said, “there’s no Eiffel tower here”. Your conclusion that he’d be the one with the problem for not seeing it is exactly what he thinks about you for not seeing “soul”. In his head they’re epistemically the same thing.
No, as I said before, I am not claiming to "know" any more than you "know". Like you I am posting my interpretation of Alan's words. And my interpretation is an "everyday meaning" regardless of whether you agree or not. Surely you are used to people ignoring you when you insist your "everyday meanings" are the only possible meanings words have - it's happened often enough. It's up to Alan to clarify his meaning. He hasn't appeared to clarify anything about the Eiffel Tower vs souls.
Nope. His problem isn’t that he doesn’t have evidence that would convince me – it’s that he doesn’t have evidence at all. You can test this because to claim evidence he has to set the bar so low that it lets in anything else that may pop into someone’s head – leprechauns included. And that means that if we accept his claim of evidence then anything else that meets the same evidential standard must also be accepted on the same basis, or we conclude that he doesn’t have evidence at all.
It's called subjective evidence based on his experiences and interpretations. You don't have to accept his subjective evidence. No one is requiring you to. Many people express their beliefs about what they think is true, and often there are contradictory accounts of the same event. No one on this forum is required to accept any of them as true.
Here’s what you said in Reply 33909 when you attempted an analogy between “soul” and gender:
As has been explained to you several times now th analogy fails, and whether it’s AB’s concept of gender or anyone’s else’s concept of gender that that you’re trying to compare to his concept of “soul” makes no difference to that.
Not in Reply 33909 you didn’t. If you want to argue instead for a different type of dualism though, by all means give it a go.
Wrong again. I explained to you what “analogy” means, I showed you where you’d tried it, and I explained why it failed. You could easily have said, “OK, those are the words I used but on reflection…” or similar, but instead you just shifted ground. Dishonesty can be both by commission and by omission.
When anyone shifts ground rather than address a problem that makes them hard to pin down. Now you’ve worked through “here’s an analogy”; “it’s not an analogy”; “I’m just telling you how I treat his claims”; and (I think) back to “OK, it’s an analogy” you’ll understand the confusion.
I know you do, but that’s different from trying different replies to the same question.
I have falsified the analogy you attempted in Reply 33909. I haven’t attempted to falsify any revisions to your position you’ve made since
As I said before - you must be used to people not expressing themselves according to your demands. I repeatedly clarified the meaning of my reply 33909, based on discussions from the 'Trans Rights: a perspective' thread, which I was reading and posting on. For example, the views of trans activists who think they are innately a woman or a man born in the wrong body (rather than gender being a social construct) and that society should accept the existence of this dualism. I don't need to explain the dualism further as there is nothing more to add, either to Alan's dualism of free will based on his experiences that he attributes to a soul and God due to his faith, or to the dualism of certain gender activists who think they have an essence that is innately a particular gender. It's up to individuals how they want to treat these claims of dualism - respect them, privilege them in society, disregard them etc.
Not sure if you are actually going to engage with any of these arguments or just keep asserting that you have falsified them, but regardless of whether you engage or not, I have responded after 31st January as I intended.
Prof D's posts will have to wait for a couple more days.
