Cultivating Reflection and Understanding: Foundations and Orientations of Québec's Ethics and Religious Culture Program

Abstract

This article focuses on the conceptual foundations and orientations of Québec's “Ethics and Religious Culture” program (ERC). Its primary aim is to provide a careful and comprehensive reading of the program. It first situates the ERC program within the Québec Education Program. It then examines the ERC program's competencies and underscores the importance of these competencies for meeting the challenges of living in a pluralistic-democratic society. Critical questions are also raised, particularly with respect to the program's move away from the subjective in both the ethics and religion competencies. In the final section, the article examines the Ministerial decision to favor procedural neutrality as the ideal professional posture of teachers.

KEYWORDS:

• competencies
• epistemological foundations
• ethics
• program orientations
• reflection
• religion

Notes

R. Petrella, Désir d'Humanité: Le Droit de Rêver (Montréal, Canada: Les Éditions Écosociété, 2004), 191. Note: All the translations from French sources are the author's translations.

For an overview of these reactions, see N. Bouchard, “Living Together with Differences: Québec's New Ethics and Religious Culture Program,” Education Canada 49 (2009): 60–62.

For an overview of this situation, see the article by Boudreau in this issue.

B. Kay, “Québec's Creepy New Curriculum,” The National Post, December 17, 2008, accessed October 2009, www.nationalpost.com/todays_paper.

A Google search with the title of the article generated 3 full pages of web sites citing the article. Most use it as an argument against the program. Among these are The Coalition for Freedom in Education (www.Coalition-CLE.org). The Catholic Civil Rights League reprints the entire article (www.ccrl.ca). The Wikipedia article on the ERC program uses the National Post article as one of its sources.

A movement advocating the complete laicisation of Québec's public institutions.

M.-M. Poisson, “Le Cours Éthique et Culture Religieuse: Un Dispositif Idéologique Pour Faire Reculer les Lumières,” Public Lecture, Centre St-Pierre, Montréal, March 2009. Accessed May 28, 2009, www.philosophie.cegep.qc.ca/index.php.

The judgment was made public June 19, 2010. For the transcript of the judgment see: www.jugements.qc.ca.

Y. Boivert, “ECR et Galilée,” La Presse, June 22, 2010: A3.

A. Kohn, What Does it Mean to be Well Educated? (Boston: Beacon Press, 2004), 2.

J.-P. Béland and P. Lebuis, introduction to Les Défis de la Formation à l'Éthique et à la Culture Religieuse (Québec, Canada: Les Presses de l'Université Laval, 2008), 2.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, Québec Education Program: Preschool Education, Elementary Education (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2006): 2.

Ibid., 6.

Ibid., 5.

Ibid., 4.

Ibid., 7.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, Québec Education Program: Secondary Cycle Two (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2007): 7.

Ibid.

Ibid., 8.

Ibid.

Ibid., 10.

Ibid.

Ibid., 8.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, Establishment of an Ethics and Religious Culture Program: Providing Future Direction for all Québec Youth (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2005): 5–8.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2007, 11–13.

Ibid., 6.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, Québec Education Program: Ethics and Religious Culture (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2008), 5–7.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, 2007, 2.1–2.14.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 2.

Ibid.

Ibid., 1.

G. Leroux, Éthique, Culture Religieuse, Dialogue: Arguments Pour un Programme (Québec, Canada: Fides, 2007), 31.

The Turn to Ethics, eds. M. Garber, B. Hanssen, and R. Walkowitz (New York: Routledge, 2000), viii.

Ibid.

M. Freitag, Le Naufrage de l'Université (Montréal, Canada: Éditions Nota Bene, 1998), 276.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2005, 6.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 1.

For a discussion of moral literacy as a “culture dependent” and “intentional” process, see B. Herman, Moral Literacy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008), 79.

Ibid., 16.

Ibid., 13.

A reference to Habermas's discourse ethics appears in the program's bibliography.

J. Habermas, Justification and Application: Remarks on Discourse Ethics (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, Third Printing, 2001), 2; J. Habermas, De l'éthique de la discussion (Paris : Les Éditions du Cerf, 1992), 96. For an excellent synthesis of Habermas's discursive ethics and his conception of practical reason, see N. Bouchard, “Prenser le Dialogue en Éducation Éthique avec l'Éthique de la Discussion de Jurgen Habermas,” in Penser le Dialogue en Éducation Éthique, eds. N. Bouchard, and M.-F. Daniel (Montréal, Canada: Presses de l'Université du Québec, 2010), 153–172; N. Bouchard, Éthique et Culture Religieuse à l'École (Montréal, Canada: Presses de l'Université du Québec, 2006), 43–51.

This process is also very similar to Dan Maguire's ethical method. See D. Maguire, The Moral Choice (New York: Doubleday, 1978); D. Maguire, Death by Choice (New York: Image Books, 1984).

A. Giroux, Reconnais-Toi Toi-Même: Figures de l'Expérience morale (Montréal, Canada: Liber, 2009), 11.

E. Volant, La Maison de l'Éthique (Montréal: Liber, 2003).

Maguire 1978, 94.

Cited in R. Abbey, Charles Taylor (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000), 11.

C. Taylor, Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press), 89.

Abbey, 2009, 11.

Habermas 2001, 4; 1992, 98; Bouchard 2006, 47–48.

Habermas 2001, 6; 1992, 100.

P. Ricoeur, Soi-Même Comme un Autre (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1990), 202–236.

P. Palmer, A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2004).

Giroux 2009, 174–175.

In the original French document the competency was formulated as “Se positionner, de façon réfléchie, sur des questions éthiques.” Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, Projet de programme. Éthique et culture religieuse. Deuxième cycle du secondaire (Working document distributed but not published, September 1, 2006), 23. The policy document formulates the competency as “The ability to take a reflective position on moral or ethical issues” (Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2005, 7).

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2007, 4.15.

Ministère de l'Éducation, Teacher Training: Orientations and Professional Competencies (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2001): 36.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 2.

T. H. McLaughlin, “Beyond the Reflective Teacher,” Educational Philosophy and Theory 31 (1999): 15, 9–25.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, 2008, 20.

D. Rondeau, “Comprendre le Phénomène Religieux: Condition d'un Éthique Pluraliste,” in Béland and Lebuis, 2008, 81.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport, 2005, 10.

The AAR Religion and the Schools Task Force, Diane Moore, Chair, American Academy of Religion Guidelines for Teaching About Religion in K–12 Public Schools in the United States, http://www.aarweb.org/publications/Online_Publications/Curriculum_Guidelines/AARK-12CurriculumGuidelines.pdf, April 2010, 3; see also: D. Moore, Overcoming Religious Illiteracy: A Cultural Approach to the Study of Religion in Secondary Education (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).

The AAR Religion and the Schools Task Force 2010, 3.

Ibid.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 1.

Ibid., 37–40.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2005, 8.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 2.

Leroux 2007, 76.

I've participated in several colloquiums, conferences and public lectures on the ERC program and have come to expect that someone will take this position. Here the logic goes as follows: “Religion is about belief (a private matter). Schooling cultivates public reason, not belief. Hence, religion does not belong in public schools.” The assumption here is that only religion is belief-laden and that belief is entirely a private matter.

D. Weinstock, “Un Cours d'Éthique et de Culture Religieuse: Prochain Épisode d'un Malentendu?, ” in Quelle Formation Pour l'Enseignement de l'Éthique à l'École? ed. F. Ouellet (Québec: Les Presses de l'Université Laval, 2006), 187–196.

R. Bernstein, Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science, Hermeneutics, and Praxis (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985); (Moore, 2007, 78–83).

M. Johnson, Moral Imagination: Implications of Cognitive Science for Ethics (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1993), 220–228.

H. G. Gadamer, Truth and Method (New York: Continuum, 1975), 28.

O. Sacks, An Anthropologist on Mars (Toronto, Canada: Vintage Canada, 1996).

D. Le Breton, La Saveur du Monde: Une Anthropologie des Sens (Paris, France: Éditions Métaillié), 63.

R. Michalko, “I've Got a Blind Prof.: The Place of Blindness in the Academy,” in The Teacher's Body: Embodiment, Authority, and Identity in the Academy, eds. D. Freedman and M. Holmes (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003), 69–75.

Leroux, 2007, 98.

C. Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007), 20–22; Abbey, 2009.

Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 8.

Comité sur les Affaires Religieuses, Le Programme d'Études: Éthique et Culture Religieuse (Québec, Canada: Gouvernement du Québec, 2007), 1–17.

W. A. J. Meijer, “Plural Selves and Living Traditions: A Hermeneutical View on Identity and Diversity, Tradition and Historicity,” in International Handbook of the Religious, Moral and Spiritual Dimensions in Education, ed. M. de Souza et al. (Dordrecht: The Netherlands: Springer Academic Publishers, 2006), 322, 321–332.

Ibid., 329.

Ibid., 323.

R. Jackson, “Understanding Religious Diversity in a Plural World: The Interpretive Approach,” in (M. de Souza et al. 2006, 402).

Ibid., 403.

Ibid., 411.

Ibid., 412.

H. Nouwen, Reaching Out: Three Movements of Spiritual Life (New York: Doubleday, 1975), 59.

A. Frank, The Wounded Storyteller: Body, Illness and Ethics (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1995), 158.

B. Grelle, “Defining and Promoting the Study of Religion in British and American Schools,” in (M. de Souza et al. 2006, 469).

Ibid., 471.

F. Ouellet, “La Formation des Maîtres en Cultures Religieuse : Quelques Questions Préalables,” in (Béland and Lebuis 2008, 67).

(Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 66).

A. Frank, The Renewal of Generosity: Illness, Medicine, and How to Live (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2004), 44.

Bouchard 2006, 9.

In this issue, see Moore, 2007, 78–82.

T. Cathcart and D. Klein, Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar … (New York: Penguin Books, 2007), 179.

Taylor 2007, 565.

R. Kraut, What is Good and Why: The Ethics of Well-Being (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 64.

Johnson 1993, 240–243).

(Ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport 2008, 12).

Ibid., 13.

T. Kelly, “Discussing Controversial Issues: Four Perspectives on the Teacher's Role,” Theory and Research in Social Education 14 (1986): 113–138.

Ibid., 121.

Ibid., 123.

Ibid., 127.

Ibid., 131.

Ibid.

Ibid., 129.

Ibid., 130.

Ibid., 132.

Ibid., 133.

Drawing on the work of Steven Winter, Johnson (1993) defined transperspectivity as “the ability of a physically, historically, socially, and culturally situated self to reflect critically on its own construction of a world, and to imagine other possible worlds might be constructed” (p. 241).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ronald W. Morris

Ronald W. Morris is Associate Professor, Department of Integrated Studies in Education, McGill University; Executive Director, Student Affairs for the Faculty of Education; and Research Associate for the “Research Group in Ethics Education and Ethics in Education” (www.gree.uqam.ca). His research interests include: ethics and spirituality in education, values in sexuality education, ethical perspectives on health and well-being, and narrative in moral-values education.