Last week at lunch with my friend, the topic of religion and politics came up, specifically evolution being taught in science class and the push to teach creationism or intelligent design in schools. I suggested that a comparative religions class would be a better venue to discuss matters of faith, and to explore the variety of its expressions. I also think an introductory philosophy course would be valuable. I saw the recent issue of Newsweek in which the same idea is advocated by Stephen Prothero.
The problem:
In a world where nearly every political conflict has a religious underpinning, Prothero writes that Americans are selling themselves short by remaining ignorant about basic religious history and texts, by not knowing the difference between a Sunni and a Shiite or the name of Mormonism’s holy book. “Given a political environment where religion is increasingly important, it’s increasingly important to know something about religion,” he says. “The payoff is a more involved [political] conversation.”
The suggested solution:
The book proposes a solution that is at once controversial and familiar: teach religion in public schools. Prothero believes that before graduation from high school, every American should take a Bible course and a world-religions course—dispassionate humanities courses whose purpose is not to catechize or evangelize but to educate. In colleges, he argues, we have science requirements, so why not religion? When Harvard decided recently not to make religion part of its core curriculum, “it missed an opportunity,” he says.
I would love to hear Stephen Prothero speak, but I’ll settle for reading his book, Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know–And Doesn’t.