Primary School: I sit in the hallway, while the rest of the class has a religious education

Should religion be represented in a regular school schedule? If it is to judge by the answers of the readers published by the Croatian portal Index.hr, the believers are not a place in public schools. As many as 85% of people consider it so.

The reason for this story is a photograph of a reader showing the boy sitting on a school hallway with a bag on his back. The picture was sent by his father who did not agree that this pupil of the second grade of a primary school in Split is attending a religious school.

"My child was enrolled in a religious class last year in the first grade of elementary school. During the school year, I was listening to the priest as a very bad teacher all the time. (...) I tried not to affect me, but after hearing the story that she gave a girl a lower grade than she deserved and just because she is not from his parish, I began to wonder about his expertise. My understanding of religion is the teaching of solidarity, generosity, good will ... I do not agree with this professor.

Because I do not consider the priest to be a competent person to teach my child faith and good interpersonal relationships, I decided to write a son from that elective subject, "said the boy's father

However, his father was uncomfortably surprised when he saw the school schedule: the first week is a religious class for the first time, and Wednesday for the third, while the other week the religious education is held on Mondays for the fourth time and on Wednesday the third.

The father could not tolerate the constant separation of the eighth-year-old from the rest of his peers. From the beginning of the second grade, he comes twice a week to school to hang out with his son and play with him at the playground in front of the school.

Supporters of religious education in public schools generally refer to the thesis that a religious subject is an elective subject, since each parent may choose not to go to a religious class for his or her child. But the word "choice" means choosing between two more or less equivalent choices, and when it comes to alternative religion in elementary schools, it does not exist. Because of this, many children whose parents decide not to want their child to attend a religion is forced to sit in school halls or, in the better case, spend time in a school library while their peers are in a religious education.

• 18 Jan, 2018
• 902 views