Challenging Religious Illiteracy A Critical Pedagogy for Teaching the Abrahamic Religions Professor Andrew Wright, King’s College London Teaching the Abrahamic Religions 7 th International DAN Conference, April 2009, Canberra

22 critical realism  ontological realism  epistemic relativity  judgemental rationality

33 critical religious education  focus on the most significant (critical) aspects of religions [ontological realism]  attend to key controversial (critical) issues [epistemic relativism]  seek to make informed (critical) spiritual responses [judgemental rationality]  What

44 critical pedagogy  priority of learning over teaching  teachers: professionals, not technicians  theory + practice  ‘banking’ pedagogy  ‘constructivist’ pedagogy  ‘critical’ pedagogy

55 ultimate reality (ontological realism)  religious and secular truth claims  reality: experienced, actual and real  explanatory models  propositions, stories, meta-narratives  life-worlds and worldviews  from social science to theology  from religious phenomena to sacred texts

66 contested worldviews (epistemic relativity)  embracing religious controversy  deep (ontological) differences  contested accounts of ultimate reality  learning through variation  relativity.... beyond relativism

77 religious literacy (judgemental rationality)  the pursuit of truth and truthful living  relational knowledge  personal/existential engagement  faith seeking understanding  from rationalism to wisdom  spiritual discernment

88 Jesus of Nazareth 1. Ultimate Reality (ontological realism) Address the critical question: Who was/is Jesus? 2. Contested Worldviews (epistemic relativism) Introduce critical conflicting answers > a moral teacher? (Judaism / secular humanism) > a prophet of God? (Islam) > a spirit-filled ‘superman’? (gnosticism /docetism / arianism / new age) > God incarnate? (Christianity) 3. Religious Literacy (judgemental rationality) Encourage student s’ critical (wise/informed/literate) responses