A Reflection on a Current Educational Issue in Sydney Relating to Culture and Identity: Religion and Education

In Australia, almost all private schools have some religious affiliation. Secular critics dispute that it is wrong for religious organisations such as private religious-based schools, particularly Catholic schools, to hold the power to favour certain students in relation to who they enrol as students and who they employ as staff.

I think this is irrational because the key purpose of religious-based schools is to teach and reinforce the spiritual values and morals embedded in their religion, whether it be Christian, Islamic, or Jewish values. For example, the Catholic Education Commission of Victoria stated that “Our schools promote a particular view of the person, the community, the nation and the world centred on the person and teachings of Jesus Christ, and they form an integral part of the church community in which all generations live, worship and grow together”.

To some extent, I think having a religious-based school can be beneficial for the school community. Having the school population share the same religious background can help alleviate disputes and conflict that can potentially occur due to lack of understanding of different religious bodies. For example if religious or cultural differences are not addressed in a discrete manner within a multi-faith school, students or teachers are more likely to misinterpret and take offense to this and may even feel attacked in some circumstances. However, if this occurred in a religious based school where the students and teachers all share the same religion, misconceptions are less likely to occur and students can continue to learn and appreciate the different religious cultures that exist today.

Religion has always been a big and profound part of my culture. I am Maronite Catholic so since religion was such a fundamental aspect of my life as I was growing up, my parents enrolled my sisters, brother and myself into a Catholic primary school and private Catholic secondary school. I recall high school religion as being a compulsory subject. Since I grew up in a Catholic primary school and moved on straight to a Catholic high school, I think it was really important that it was compulsory all students learnt not only about Catholicism, but also about other religions, such as Islam and Judaism.  For me, this allowed me to broaden my understanding of different religions and appreciate the various cultural aspects they are associated with. I can therefore relate with Christina Ho (2011) when she argues that “the ideal of respecting the presence of others, or recognition of the other’s legitimate presence in a shared social space, is a more realistic social goal, as opposed to a compulsory regimen of exchange and ‘harmony’”.

Hence, although students that attend religious-based schools are not exposed to different religious cultures during school hours, these schools still provide plenty of opportunities and sometimes even obligatory occasions where students discover and understand the different religious bodies that exist in society.

References:

· Ho, C. (2011). Respecting the presence of others: School micropublics and everyday multiculturalism. Journal of Intercultural Studies.

· (January 17, 2013). Schools practice what they preach. The Sydney Morning Herald: Federal Politics. Retrieved from http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/schools-practise-what-they-preach-20130116-2ctpf.html.