On Holy Ground: The Theory and Practice of Religious Education

<p>Religion has had notable and renewed prominence in contemporary public and political life. Religious questions have also been freshly examined in philosophy and theology the natural sciences the social sciences psychology phenomenology politics and the arts. These fields reflect complex multi-disciplinary understandings of religion some hostile some accommodating. For religious education this has all contributed to its own international renaissance. Religious education in ensuring it is contemporary shares with these fields the same criticality the same distance between the study of religion and the religious life. </p><p>Yet what are the <i>grounds</i> of this modern religious education? Through a systematic historical and contemporary cross-disciplinary analysis answering this question is the ambitious task of the book. </p><p>Chapters include: </p><ul> <p> </p> <li>philosophy theology and religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>the natural sciences and religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>the social sciences and religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>psychology spirituality and religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>phenomenology and religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>the politics of religious education</li> <p> </p> <li>the aesthetics of religious education.</li> </ul><p>The central problem of all modern religious education remains this: what are the <i>grounds </i>of religious education when religious education is no longer grounded in the religious life in the <i>life</i> of the holy? Although this primarily appears to be an epistemological problem it soon becomes a moral and existential one. The book will be of key interest to teachers theorists and researchers working in religious education.</p>