Date: Mon, 16 Feb 2004 09:20:17 +0000 From: "steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk" <steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk> Subject: Re: children to study aethism in schools Hugh/all I would have been happier if they had renamed the courses "stories, religion and myth" but they have instead decided to argue for the renaming to be "religious, philosophical and moral education". At which point your implied objection to the teaching of 'aethism' and 'agnosticism' as socio-philosophical discourses of equal worth and value to religious doctrine becomes mistakern. The author you quote is mistaken - morality and ethics, that is to say human conduct has nothing to do with religion, and to approach the myth that Islam is an issue in the contemporary world in this way is mistaken. In the specific case it (the author) is discussing, religion has become one of the few aspects of certain societies which has remained unaffected by the forces of empire and colonialism, consequently it is hardly surprising that human resistence has tended to be focused through these areas. It is to be regreted that the theocratic responses have tended to be on the reactionary side, they usually are, but there are signs of hope in organisations like Hezbollah gradually mutating into poltical parties. Perhaps more pertinant to the list is that notions of religion and god(s) should be kept out of morality, ethics and judgement. Where Levinas and the post-secular approaches, reintroduce it - we should be resisting this terrible tendency to reintroduce issues of religion and god into the judgement of human conduct. "Unbelievers could easily react to these questions with ironic laughter as they think of all the crimes committed in the name of religion, the wars fought on behalf of religion and the guilt and misery that has been imnosed on human beings who have deviated from religious norms..." (Bishop Richard Holloway). It is rather unfortunate, and this is happening at the moment, that religions "tend to associate God(s) with particular phases in social development" The most obvious example today is the necessity to recognise that gender relations reflect social and historical realities; whereas the religious claim has been that they have been "established by god in a specific pattern". The latter position after all forces us to critique god - the former allows for a legitimate critique of male dominance which recognises that God is a social construct (to some extent at least) which mutates and changes. Currently most religions and use of God tends towards the reactionary - where Holloway and Tutu want it to represent liberation they of necessity have to construct it as a human construct.... must go.. steve hbone wrote: >Steve, > >"Children will be taught about atheism during religious education classes >under official plans being drawn up to reflect the decline in churchgoing in >Britain." > >This sounds like teaching Peacemaking in the military academies. > >The author of "The Trouble with Islam" says: religion is about one's >conduct towards others. >Is that what atheism is about, or is it simply the the struggle to implant >the minds of innocent children with one dogmatic belief system that drives >out another . > >regards, >Hugh > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > >----- Original Message ----- >From: <steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk> >To: <lyotard-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU>; "Eric" <ericandmary-AT-earthlink.net> >Sent: Sunday, February 15, 2004 3:08 PM >Subject: children to study aethism in schools > > > > >>A report in the Observer today - >> >>http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,5500,1148669,00.html >> >>a small victory perhaps but a significant one - >> >>regaqrds >>steve >> >> >> >> > > > > --- StripMime Warning -- MIME attachments removed --- This message may have contained attachments which were removed. Sorry, we do not allow attachments on this list. --- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts --- multipart/alternative text/plain (text body -- kept) text/html ---
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