A SCOTTISH church leader has criticised a move to change the name of prayer sessions in schools.
The Church of Scotland and the Humanist Society Scotland are preparing a joint plan to put to MSPs to replace religious assemblies in schools with a "Time for Reflection" slot.
The petition to MSPs will suggest that pupils opt in to religious observance in schools instead of being able to opt out as at present.
The Rev David Robertson, Free Church of Scotland minister in Dundee and director of the Solas Centre for Public Christianity, said: "We have the extraordinary situation where the Church of Scotland, which claims to be the Church of John Knox, is undermining his core policy, that there should be a Christian school in every parish."
He added: "If the Church of Scotland stab-in-the-back for Christianity is accepted I would suggest Christians should automatically opt their children out of this compulsory State godless religion.
"It would be far better to have meaningful Christian worship which pupils and teachers could opt in to, rather than force everyone to go to the beige, bland, brain-dead, unquestioning banalities that would … result."
The Church of Scotland and the Humanist Society of Scotland say legislation to change the name of "Religious Observance" to "Time for Reflection" would make such periods more inclusive after concerns over gatherings where one belief system is said to have been promoted over another.
The Rev Sally Foster Fulton, convenor of the Church of Scotland's Church and Society Council, said earlier: "Regular, inclusive Time for Reflection will enhance young people's ability to celebrate difference."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article