Theology in multi-faith Religious Education: a taboo to be broken?

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the place of ‘theology’ in multi-faith Religious Education (RE) in English schools without a religious affiliation, highlighting reasons for its sometimes taboo-status, particularly since the emergence of Ninian Smart’s phenomenological approach to Religious Studies in the late 1960s. The article explores a diversity of definitions of theology within specific professional and ecclesiastical discourses, and recasts recent debates by focusing not on whether theology and theological inquiry should contribute to so-called 'non-confessional' RE, but on how different forms of theology and theological inquiry might do so legitimately. In the process, the article challenges binary oppositions that have traditionally distinguished the disciplines of Theology from Religious Studies, and argues in favour of the application of various forms of theology and theological inquiry within a critical, dialogic and inquiry-led approach to multi-faith RE. What this might mean in practice is discussed with regard to three concepts: positionality, empathy and critique. Ultimately, multi-faith RE is characterised as occupying a liminal space betwixt and between disciplinary, interpretative and methodological perspectives involved in the study of religion(s) and worldview(s).

KEYWORDS:

• Theology
• theological inquiry
• Religious Education (RE)
• pedagogy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. We use ‘inquiry’ rather than ‘enquiry’ in the context of ‘inquiry-led learning’. Although often used interchangeably, ‘enquiry’ has connotations of asking for or requesting pre-existing information, while ‘inquiry’ is often associated with researching or investigating to generate new knowledge (Baumfield and Higgins 2008).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Westhill Endowment Tust and Bible Society (England and Wales) as part of ‘The Art of Narrative Theology in Religious Education: Phase Four’ project.

Notes on contributors

Rob Freathy

Rob Freathy is Professor of Education in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Exeter, UK.

Anna Davis

Anna Davis is an Honorary Research Fellow in the Graduate School of Education at the University of Exeter, UK.