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Religious Education: The Dawn of a New Approach?

December 05, 2025 by Matthew Allen

Holding Bible

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One thing is for certain: we live in an unpredictable world, and even the most sacred of sacred cows can be herded in a new direction.

After the best part of two decades with no change in the Northern Ireland Religious Education (RE) curriculum, the UK Supreme Court has ruled it unlawful for schools to provide RE which is not ‘objective, critical, and pluralistic’. In other words, teachers cannot deliver the curriculum in a manner which ‘amounts to indoctrination’. This is taken as read in American public schools. But across the pond, it has been a controversial development.

For context, all state-funded schools here must provide students with RE lessons, the bulk of which focus on Christian scripture and ethics. Before last month’s judgement, however, schools did not have to practise an even-handed, “both sides” approach or even take a dispassionate, neutral stance on the material covered. It has now been decided that failure to do so transgresses the European Convention on Human Rights.

In such a sensitive area, perhaps it was inevitable the Court would leave room for interpretation; and so, there have been different views as to what implications the judgement will have. I don’t expect a massive shift in the secular direction. This ruling, it seems to me, was not about what is taught in RE but, rather, how the curriculum is imparted.

Indeed, the BBC headline, “Supreme Court rules Christian-focused RE taught in NI schools is unlawful”, does not make this distinction clear; taken at face value, the headline implies that Acts has been axed. This has not happened. Neither has Genesis been jettisoned.

This was grist for the local talk radio mill, shows where the general public are able to phone in. Islam suffered the wrath of several different callers on one programme I heard; there were those who seemed to think the Qur’an has chased the Bible from public life.

Given the sheer volume of calls about Islam after the judgement was announced, a casual observer would think it was the Muslim Council of Britain which interpreted the law rather than the UK Supreme Court. Some people never miss their chance to bash Islam, I suppose.

I welcome the Court’s decision for what it is (not for what people who haven’t read it assume that it is): an affirmation that RE has to be delivered ‘in an objective, critical, and pluralistic manner’, not as a workshop on the personal beliefs and biases of an individual teacher.

In the context of Northern Ireland, where pockets of religious fundamentalism still prevail, the Court’s decision was an important one. It is unlawful for teachers now to characterise LGBT-phobic views, for example, as fact – if, indeed, this was ever lawful – without reference to the counterargument. It is better to have more guardrails like this, where kids and their mental health are concerned, than fewer.

If a science lesson is not up to standard, a pupil could miss the difference between meiosis and mitosis. That’s far from ideal. But if an RE lesson is not ‘objective, critical, and pluralistic’, the consequences could be dire; atrocious ideas – eternal conscious torment in hell, etc. – could be passed off as fact with serious repercussions for the mental welfare of kids.

Religion exists to raise us up ‘with wings like eagles’, to better and higher things, not cripple us with mental health issues.

Parents are not able to choose who teaches RE to their children. It’s the luck of the draw. Junior’s RE teacher could be the most esteemed theologian in town or a fire-and-brimstone lunatic. If a curriculum is ‘objective, critical, and pluralistic’, this becomes less of a problem; because, if implemented to the letter, it would streamline children’s experiences of RE.

Should a school decide that it would like a forum in which teachers can share their faith with students, which is understandable if the school has an established religious ethos, then a Christian Union (or even some kind of interfaith club) after school would be the place and the time for this.

For those of a Christian faith, RE lessons can work hand in hand with church attendance. Religious facts – the narrative detail of the biblical stories; the contents of the Nicene Creed – can, and should, be taught in schools. Parents can show their children, at home, how to sift and organise these facts in accordance with whichever tradition is followed in the household.

The Supreme Court acknowledged this in its judgement: ‘Parents have an undoubted right in their own homes… to guide and encourage their children to believe in and to practice religion…’

I know that it’s the modern habit for parents to let kids figure their own beliefs out, whereas ‘the gods of our father and our house’ is a notion best left in Game of Thrones. But I would argue that religious faith is part of our legitimate inheritance from our forebears, to be passed on as a token of love which binds generations together.

That, however, is a theme for another time.

I don’t believe that Christians need lose a night’s kip over this judgement. It does not remove a single jot or tittle of RE from the curriculum. Instead, it reconfigures how the subject is taught in a more inclusive manner; and this is to be welcomed.

12/5/2025 6:55:30 PM

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About Matthew Allen

Matthew Allen is a writer and musician based in Northern Ireland. He is a graduate of Queen’s University, Belfast, where he studied Theology and Liberal Arts.

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