Religious education in our schools is not indoctrination

I READ with interest Andrew Denholm's article on religious education ("Children 'facing Christian indoctrination in schools'", The Herald, April 16).

As an RE teacher in a non-denominational school I have often been puzzled about the legal right for parents to withdraw their children from RE lessons. The syllabus demands that various philosophical approaches, including Humanism, are taught. Valuable skills in the application of knowledge, analysis and evaluation are given priority, with pupils encouraged to express their own views in an articulate manner. I have never experienced "indoctrination" in almost 20 years of teaching RE. Why shouldn't biology, art or business education also have an opt-out clause in that case?

Please enable cookies in your browser to display the rest of this article.