The religiosity of individuals is a fundamental dimension that has strong repercussions and that culturally defines civilizations among them with a very singular, "European-style" character. The challenge of addressing this issue does not mean addressing the "non-religious", as if those who are not religious do not have to reflect on this question, prejudging that the "problem" belongs only to those who ignore the religious and spiritual dimension of their lives. On the contrary, "talking" about the fact and the religious experience becomes an inclusive bet: for those who believe that nothing of value exists outside this present, for those who believe that one must wield the sword of faith, instead of that of peace as its main fruit; for those who hide under an "anonymous" religiosity; for those who believe that it is useless to believe because it is enough to exercise justice and tolerance, that is, for the one who lives as if God did not exist, complacently accepting, without asking too many questions, the values that religious culture promotes. And also for those who wonder whether in the essence of our humanity there might not be something superior to oneself. And, of course, for those who understand and live this way.
When the team of the European Foundation Society and Education learned of Porticus Iberia's interest in having more information on the situation of religious education in Spain, they understood the importance of facing this challenge not only from a multidisciplinary research approach, but also from the knowledge of our own reality. The project, which began with the title Civil society, religiosity and education started from a study of context, that is, from analyzing the field in which it was to be developed, linking it to Spanish society, without forgetting that, to a large extent, what was concluded here could be perfectly extensible to the European framework in which Western democracies operate. By doing so, its areas of work and its results had more options of becoming a dynamic agent of a conversation on one of the questions that most concerns mankind of all times.
Civil society, religiosity and educationThe project, from a sociological point of view, is a wide-ranging project on the reciprocal influences and relationships between society and the religiosity of individuals, on the presence and relevance of religious fact and experience in the public sphere and in the cultural traditions of peoples, and on the participation of education in the evolution and nature of these relationships.
From the point of view of legal science, it seemed to us important and proper to an order of democratic coexistence based on respect for the Law, to recall, on the one hand, the legal principles that underpin the rights of freedom, including the right to religious freedom in our national and European framework; on the other hand, to seek in the 2030 Agenda an area of protection of cultural rights, to ensure the expression of religiosity in the public space, in the teaching of religion in schools and in the promotion of intercultural dialogue.
The orientation towards the cultivation of the spiritual realm through school declines from year to year: the percentage of students choosing Catholic Religion as a subject drops, a particularly sharp change between primary, secondary and baccalaureate levels. At the latter two levels, students are much less dependent on their parents for their choice and prefer to teach religion to a much lesser extent, especially in public schools. In addition, there is the circumstance of the particular employment status of religion teachers in Spain, the absence of an evaluation of the impact of the teaching of religion in the school, on its quality and training, the self-perception they transmit about their own prestige, their professional insertion in the school and the professional relationships they establish with their teaching colleagues, among other aspects.
Undoubtedly, considering the passage through schools as a unique period for the awakening of questions about meaning is an opportunity for which we are all in some way responsible; not so much for their answers, but for what they will be in the future, as men and women, believers or non-believers, autonomously and freely responsible. In short, all these brushstrokes have to do with a much more ambitious theme: the social perception of the religious fact and the mark left by the school, in part through the formative action of religion teachers.
Research Director. European Foundation Society and Education
