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Christianity as a World ReligionHarry UndyPublished online: 06 Jul 2006.

To cite this article: Harry Undy (1982) Christianity as a World Religion, British Journal of Religious Education, 4:2, 80-87

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HARRY UNDY

Christianity as a World Religion

Teachers are constantly looking for additionalresources for their subject, and with the limita-tions of time and money experienced by REteachers it is doubly welcome if such resourcesrelate to a line of curriculum development whichdoes not demand that something extra becrammed into the overflowing pint pot. Aconcern with Christianity as a world religiontherefore appeals in a number of different ways,offering development with economy. It must beadmitted that some of the present argumentsabout RE are made more pointed, but at sometime such questions (as whether we are involvedin Religious Education or in the transfer of infor-mation about religions, the place of a readyacknowledgement of commitment as the basis foran assurance of openness, and the risk whichreligious wholeness poses to any settled andstructured community) will have to be workedthrough.

Christianity (in some presentations) is alreadya major element of RE. As a world religion itattains a genuine three (or four) dimensionalstatus. The additional range of illustrationsand examples reduces teacher boredom.Current practice in RE provides the basis forreflection and development. There is a clearcontribution to good community relations.

All the proper constraints of subject/academic/professional integrity are honoured.There is a strong, if unidentified or

unacknowledged, tendency to assume that ethnicor geographical origin determines religiousallegiance. The small print on maps which showthe geographical distribution of major religionsdoes little to counter this, and the convenientshorthand of 'eastern religions' makes theimpression deeper. Of course there is a stronglink between nationality, culture and religious

expression, and equally there is a distrust by anational majority of people who opt into a'different' ethos (witness the Iranian persecutionof the Bahai, the Indian 'Freedom of Religion'legislation against Christians, and some Britishfeelings about white/British Muslims or Buddhistmonks).

Over-simplication is not simply misleading — itis wrong. Teachers who take world religionsseriously already know that the Egyptian expres-sion of Islam is not just the same as for SaudiArabia or Pakistan, that Sephardic andAshkenazi Judaism can be distinguished, andthat Tibetan Buddhism is a far cry from theJapanese versions. Similarly, the presentation ofa Christianity which is a flat, two-dimensional,white European, literate form, is dangerous. OnChristian grounds it could be criticized assuggesting that the important thing is to be loyalto (orthodox within) a definable or prescribablestructure called Christianity rather than to relatewithin a community to God known through theChrist-person; on educational grounds it issimply inadequate for anything but thememorization of a conveniently assessable bodyof information.

Because Christianity itself is not simply asystem of dogma, but is concerned with andbased upon relationships, those parts of anycourse which deal with Christianity (butespecially a secondary school RE course) musttake account of relationships. For presentpurposes it is proposed to deal with three areas:

(a) The relationships between Christians andtheir overlapping and concentric socialspheres.

(b) The relationships between the familiar formsof Christianity and their wider historicalcontext.

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(c) The relationships between expressions ofChristianity (in documents, words andstructures) with which our society is familiarand other current expressions.

A. SocietyWhen such topics as drugs, sex and work were

introduced to the RI syllabus, it was assumedthat the basis on which they would beapproached was 'Christian' (i.e., the 'best' ofBritish cultural standards would be applied).Some of these topics may now be considered aspart of a consideration of Islam, Judaism, etc.,but apart from such special religious contextsthey are likely to be taken into an ME course ormodule. There is, however, considerabledifficulty in identifying a moral approach whichdoes not rely on a specific religious basis, orwhich is not the general view of one particularstratum tied to its own time and place. A con-sideration of Christian views on monogamy,wealth, violence, ecology, would be enlivened bylistening to the variety of views from Africa,Asia, Latin America and the Pacific.

One social topic which has global relevanceand which also provides resources for thestudy/experience of Christianity as a world reli-gion is World Development. It has to beunderstood first that this should not be thoughtof as merely the study of poverty/hunger/oppression in the Third World; it is concernedwith human development within the actualor potential community of humanity, sothat economics has a part to play within abroader human context (i.e., within the oikumene— the inhabited world/universe).

As concepts do not have to be exclusivelyChristian in order to be specifically Christian, itis easy to see how world development provides afield for Christian studies.

The idea of human community springs from(and illustrates) the Bible from Genesis to Revela-tion, with special application to the prophets andthe concept of salvation. The discipline ofsharing is Bible-related, and has been a key tounderstanding the foundation and daily life ofChristian communities (not only monasticgroups). The work of missionary, aid anddevelopment agencies as expressions (or mis-apprehensions) of Christian duties of co-

responsibility offers scope for the exercise ofChristian ethics.

While not all teachers can be expected tomaster the statistical complexities of some aspectsof world development, it is difficult to see howthe use of stories and reports could notilluminate, for example, the teachings of Amos orthe second great commandment.

For teachers whose custom is to begin with aBible passage (possibly in conformity with anexternal examination) the concerns of develop-ment education provide illumination for suchpassages as the stories of Creation (with theemphases on sufficiency, responsibility andstewardship) and related Psalms, the Josephstories, many of the legislative passages of Torah,etc. Alternative starting points include a critiqueof the fund-raising advertising of some aidagencies (diminishing both giver and recipient byPavlovian triggering of the pity response whichbecomes the sole relationship) and the manipula-tion of poor peasants for the maximization of(exportable) profits by remote land owningcorporations. Any of these illustrations could beparalleled in British society; it is important toretain the true world dimension of development,which considers here as well as there.

On a different line of enquiry, the outwardlooking practical interest of the Church couldwell be traced, beginning perhaps with thePauline collection for the poor in the Jerusalemchurch (which even then was a cross-cultural,inter-racial operation) moving on through thesocial service offered by the monasteries in morecircumscribed conditions (though still the inter-national element was present in monasticorganizations) to the present day where concernis more likely to be for the oikumene as familythan only for the body of believers, and whererelief measures may be accompanied by judg-ments expressed on the structures through whichthe oppressive exploitative powers are exercised.

B. Finding a contextThe Church, as the organism through which

Christianity is met, observed and experienced,has to be set in context. This is done in severalways, and in nearly every one the world dimen-sion offers stimulating possibilities.

History In dealing with the growth of the

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Church in the early centuries, the New Testa-ment is a key document. This was, however,gathered and approved in and for a Europeancentred Church. The return home of theEthiopian eunuch, the origin of Simon of Cyreneand his sons is noted but otherwise the picture isof a progress into southern Europe with acommon hint of further westward expansion.This original bias has been a spring-board forstudies which have shown by implication how theBritish Isles (apparently) became the centre ofChristianity.

Mark's work in Alexandria and the growth ofthe surviving Coptic and Ethiopian OrthodoxChurch is mostly ignored, and except at higherlevels of study so is the scholarly influence of theNorth African Church before the great Muslimexpansion. The facts and legends of the eastwardexpansion (St. Thomas, the Syrian Church, etc.)are seldom mentioned, although there are datableremains in modern Pakistan (First century), SriLanka (AD 530) and China (AD 630-635). Pupilsare left to assume that all Europe wasevangelizeu as part of the westward (Catholic)sweep, with no mention of northward outreachthrough Georgia and Armenia. It is interesting,and perhaps salutary, to note that Columbaarrived at Iona in AD 563.

Such a limited view is only a religious versionof the Euro-centric arrogance which describesthe Americas and Africa as being 'discovered'in the fifteenth century (by which timeindigenous empires had already flourished andfailed) but in the teaching of history at least theseblinkers are being removed. Our own culture andChurch are not diminished but enriched whenthe setting is the world.

The pressures of time normally mean that thenext thousand or so years are given little atten-tion, while the Church confirmed its authorityand separated into denominations largely withinnational boundaries. If this attitude is con-venient, some mention should be made of thevaried fortunes of the Church in North Africa,East Africa, India and China.

When the political/cultural/economic expan-sion of European powers began (about thesixteenth century) the priests and pastors of theexplorers and emigrants accompanied them tominister to them. It is not necessary to labour theclose relationship between Church and State to

suggest what a shock it was when some of theclergy (notably Bartholomew de las Casas, 1515)defended the indigenous people against theexploitation of the colonists. Even so, it was anotable extension of 'pastoral care' when mis-sionaries were explicitly appointed and supportedto evangelize the 'natives'. In many places wherethere was a strong colonial settlement the mis-sionaries to the natives had little contact with theclergy for the colonists, although the culturallimitations of the missionaries (including theinability to see that they were culturally limited)identified them with the occupying/exploitingpowers.

In thinking of the missionary endeavour of theperiod (approx. 1750/1950) a number of ideasmust be held in tension:

the settlers, missionaries, governments andchurchly bodies should be considered by theirown lights, including two basic assumptions:

to be Western was to be civilized - anythingelse was barbarian;a doctrine of inevitable progress followedthe experience of industrial/technologicaldiscovery and expansion, while the realityof sin, evil and depravity was assured bygeneral social observations;

many of the cult heroes of the 'missionary era'were quite unbearable as companions orcolleagues for those who expected to beregarded as equals;the strength of genuine resentment by third orfourth generation Christians today thatEuropeans offered the Bible and took the landis matched by the pity for a Europe whichnow has material wealth but no spiritualresources;the voluntary nature of the missionaryenterprise, coupled with the enthusiasm of thesupporters, meant that for many westernChristians 'mission' developed an almostexclusively specialist, professional, largelyforeign reference; a strong sectarian spirit ofcompetition (which owed an incalculable debtto secular society) frequently affected lines ofmissionary advancement and consolidation(comity agreements were not always made,and when made were not always honoured).Concern with missionary activity must not

stop with the Livingstone-Aylward period (andthe average Mother Teresa project may advance

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the calendar but not the concept). At any time, inany place, the work of mission was not simply thework of the missionary; local evangelists wereessential. The position now is that thepartnership between expatriate missionary andlocal church (embryo or established) is seen to beof a potential value hitherto unguessed, so thatmissionaries are called and sent from all parts ofthe world to all parts. This means that twoapparently incongruous developments have to bementioned.

The first is the growth of world-wide con-fessional organizations. The Lutheran WorldFederation, the World Methodist Conference,the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, theBaptist World Alliance, the Anglican Consulta-tive Council, etc., are all basically westernattempts to provide forums in whichrepresentatives of national expressions of thesesections of the church can meet on equal terms.Part of the value of these structures is theopportunity to consider partnership in mission.Within the Vatican and between the OrthodoxChurches there have been some developmentstowards similar ends.

While denominations have accepted the forceof world mission, there has also been a growth incommitment to unity. The potentiality forreconciliation of these two forces may be shownin the change by which the (independent) Inter-national Missionary Council became the Com-mission for World Mission and Evangelism(CWME) of the World Council of Churches, andthere is now a Conference for World Mission(CFWM) as a Division of the British Council ofChurches (BCC).

It may be difficult to appreciate the force ofthe unity movement from a British standpoint (ithas been suggested that for British Christians,denominations provide a substitute fortribalism), but the traditional picture ofChristianity as accepting division without ques-tion or remorse (repentance) should be counteredwith at least an historical review. (See below,page 86).

C. Christian ExpressionChristianity can be observed only in the acts of

people and the consequences of those acts. Toachieve any understanding of Christianity there

has to be reasonable consideration of the motiva-tion and intended meaning of these acts. Hence aschool study of Christianity normally includesvisits to church buildings, references to Bible,hymn and prayer books, and consideration ofacts of worship, as well as some interest in local,national and international service (ministry)agencies.

The structure of the Christian Year is basicallythe same world-wide, reflecting the one Incarna-tion, Passion/Resurrection and Pentecost(harvest festivals vary according to hemisphereand climate).

This unity of faith is somehow emphasized bythe illustrative use of culturally varied expres-sions, e.g., in music, drama and art. These can beused to show both the personal and the com-munal nature of commitment response, and com-munication of belief. Many schools already haveavailable expressions of faith drawn from quitedifferent cultures. (See below, page 86). Film,video and recorded resources are also available toenrich the syllabus.

Of potentially greater interest to some modernteenagers is the way the Church develops its ownunderstanding of its nature and the requirementsof obedience to God. The current westernEuropean tradition assumes that Christiangroups rightly and necessarily belong withinhistorical structures of graduated authority, andthat theology is studied as an academic exercisewhose finest practitioners occupy universitychairs and publish learned tomes.

The electronic Church and the personalizedcampaigns of the major-league evangelists maybe excluded from a study in RE as being alocalized aberration (though it is perhaps doubt-ful whether such a conscious decision is taken).

Two other developments are experienced onevery continent, and can be ignored only at theexpense of presenting a false picture ofChristianity today.

Christian Grassroots Communities or BasicCommunities (CBCs) have been a feature of theChurch since the earliest days. On his releasefrom prison, Peter went to Mary's house becausethat was where the church gathered [Acts 12.12]and Paul sent greetings to house churches [Col.4.15]. It is possible to exploit the modern world-wide phenomenon of CBCs to illuminate eitherNew Testament study or the experiences of

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persecuted minorities of the European reforma-tion.

The most readily accessible accounts may bethose relating to the CBCs of Latin America,which arose from the shortage of ordained priestsin areas predominantly Roman Catholic. Whereworship is essentially structured, sacramentaland dependent upon the presence of an ordainedman, the absence of a priest from a group whichis determined to worship can be expected toproduce new patterns of gathering and newmodes of expressing faith in community. Therehas been opposition from some sections of thehierarchy, but also enthusiastic support frommany priests, while the presence and experienceof the protestant minority has also been a factor.In the CBCs an intimate relationship of dailysocial experience and faithful Bible study hasproduced an important development in 'church'as a focus of commitment and a source oiteaching.

It may be tnat tne growth of CBCs in Italyowes most to reaction against the struggle of theCatholic Church to retain its traditionalinfluence in the face of opposition and alter-natives. The eight century long witness of thesmall Waldensian Church may also have con-tributed, but most of the CBCs seem to havegrown up in urban areas where a proletariat hasfound a priest willing to accompany or lead themout of the normal setting in order to be obedientto what they see as Christ's call in theirexperience.

In China the position is so fluid that no clearpicture can yet be described, but the growth ofCBCs (house churches) through the ten years ofthe cultural revolution is well attested. Up to thelate 1970s Christian groups in the West wereasking what factors in Chinese culture mightaccount for the repeated total failure ofChristianity to take root in China; by mid-1980it was clear that there are more Christians inChina now than there were when missionariesleft in the early 1950s and when the formalChurch structures disappeared (and buildingswere confiscated) under the cultural revolution.There is now a western tendency to assert thatthe house church movement is a rival to theresurgent structured Church, but most reportsout of China seem to indicate that the CBC is away in which the Church lives, and will now con-

tinue to live in parallel with the formal gather-ings in reopened church buildings withreappointed pastors.

It might be interesting to involve some pupilsin identifying and considering similar groups intheir own areas, noting that the key features arenot just smallness (and not introvert separation)but confidence, full 'lay' participation inleadership, and a determination to relate faithand life.

The development of 'non-formal' theologiesseems to be associated with the growth ofCBCs, but this is no place to argue for thisbeing a causal relationship in either direction.It should also be noted as a preliminarythat the theologians who have published(publicized/popularized) these theologies are notthemselves the innovators, but have the skillsand training and outlets to make available and todevelop what comes from the people. Anotherpreliminary comment is that in much of Africa(where geography and population distributionalso produce groups akin to CBCs) theology isoral and more likely at present to be written asarticles, letters and poems than as tomes — but itis nonetheless theology. (A significant exceptionbecause it is not the work of someone trained inwestern-style universities, is the KimbanguistStatement of Theology drawn up to satisfywestern needs. (See Out of Africa, Ed. H. Undy,CEM 1980.))

A general European assumption is thattheology is 'read' and developed in approvedscholarly academic institutions, and after somedelay will be conveyed to the people in due form;i.e., theology is advanced by studying theology.In terms of world Christianity we have to acceptthat this is not the only valid exploration of theWord of God (and we should be aided in this byBonhoeffer's experience).

Theologies of liberation grew out of theexperience of the CBCs in Latin America.Centred in the Gospels, but supported in theNew and Old Testaments generally, God'sconcern with liberation seemed to a poor andoppressed people to be at the heart of hisrelationship with the world. It is not only thepoor who are to be liberated, but also theiroppressors.

Pablo Richard, of Chile, offers a three-partdefinition. The theology of liberation is:

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a critical reflection on the practice of belief;a theology of redemption within the concretehistorical and political conditions of today;a militant theology, which serves socialanalysis and the transformation of history.

It is thoroughly Biblical — often conservativeand certainly evangelical. In three identifiabletheological principles the transcendant and thesuper-natural are very strongly represented.

(i) Salvation history is at the heart of all humanhistory - both scripture and theology havetheir reality within the concrete social,economic and political realities of our timeand place.

(ii) The God whom the Bible reveals is a God ofjustice — the people of God therefore live an'Exodus experience', and move from anexistence of slavery and oppression to one offreedom and community. God metes outjustice; he also demands that humans treatone another justly.

(iii) Sin and redemption are experienced in com-munity — while sin is also personal andindividual, original sin is placed within theoppressive social and political structures(bringing it back from the irrelevance it hasin western theology); the masses of the poorknow about sin because they live and die inoppressive systems — an essential part ofhuman redemption is therefore liberationfrom these structures.

Although Latin America's links are stronglywestern/capitalist, it is sometimes charged thatthe theology of liberation is motivated anddominated by Communism/Marxism. CertainlyMarxist techniques for the study and analysis ofsociety are used as a tool by the more scholarlypractitioners, but since the days of the Spanishand Portuguese conquest there has been conflictbetween the Church's voice of judgment and thepolitical authorities. Even before Bartholomewde las Casas (see above, p 82) the DominicanFather Antonio do Montesinos at SantoDomingo in 1511 used the text 'A voice crying inthe wilderness' to chastise Spaniards for theiroppression of the Indians. Perhaps the most'Marxist' aspect of the theology of liberation isthe attitude to what is the proper activity oftheologians/philosophers - not reflecting uponthe world, but changing it.

Any teacher looking at the Biblical story otExodus or any of its echoes might find consider-able help in the theology of liberation, andperhaps especially in the experiences ofNicaragua. (The Exodus experience of LatinAmerica was in expectation and continuingexperience, and hence the theology has adynamic of liberation for people; in interestingcontrast, the Exodus experience of the Boers ofSouth Africa was completed, and so the theologyhas a very closed aspect of once-for-all God-givendominance in the Promised land.) If teachershave not kept a newspaper clipping file onNicaragua, CAFOD could provide some informa-tion, and El Salvador seems likely to provide aneven longer story of suffering before liberation.

Minjung theology (theology of the people) hada somewhat surprising starting point in SouthKorea, with the theologians naming prison astheir school and the life and death struggleagainst the rules which led to their suffering asthe occasion for learning. Minjung theology is aphenomenon in which theologians andintellectuals try to overcome their importedtheologies and make a step forward from thechurch 'for others' to the church 'of others'. It isinspired particularly by Mark's Gospel, in whichthe disciples leave Jerusalem for Galilee, wherethey are to find their Lord among the people(good and proper members of society as well asthe bad outsiders).

Minjung — the people — is the subject ofhistory. The key concepts of Christianity have tobe understood in relation to the people (which isnot just the proletariat). In the view of Prof. AhnByung Mu there is a special connection betweenthe history (experience) of Minjung and the NewTestament: 'The Gospel of Mark is not"Expanded Kerygma" but is a theology ofMission. The stories were consciously taken upand transmitted. The Kerygma is not eliminatedin this process. In Mark it is not a question oftheory but it is about its relation to Minjung.There is no strong logic as in Paul for example,but he lives. He sees Christ with living eyes. Withthe eyes of Minjung. Therefore Biblical formcriticism sometimes goes too far. The purposeshould be not to analyse form but to see life.'

Arising from their prison experience, the

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Minjung theologians have given particularemphasis to art and poetry as means by which intheir own environment they can be in touch with'the people'.

Cultural expressions (such as art and poetry,but also all kinds of popular music, drama andstory-telling) are not concerned only with thesecular but also with the sacred aspects of life.Indeed, for many Christians this two part view oflife is a totally artificial and wrong dichotomy,and in some regions is resented as a weakening ordenial of the truly Christian life-view.

Schools may already offer pupils someexperience of Christian expression from anotherculture — the words and music of ancient hymns,English mystery plays and the art forms ofmedieval Europe — though these are not alwaysstudied. If more recent school hymn books areused, contemporary words and music from othercontinents might be available (in translationsfrom Indian, Chinese and African languages).Given that the content of the Christian faith isthe same throughout the world, a breadth ofunderstanding could be gained by the deliberateexploitation of expressions in different cultures.These will include such familiar items as negrospirituals and also poetry, picture, sculpture, film(dance/drama) and music. With some groups themusic could be taken beyond such items as theMissa Luba and Missa Creole, etc. to consider theattempt at synthesis in Africa Sanctus (DavidFanshawe). Music tapes of normal worship arealso available (see the catalogues of overseas divi-sions and councils and missionary societies of theBritish churches).

Perhaps the most pervasive assumption whichaffects a study of Christianity today is that the'macro-structure' of the Church in this countryis repeated throughout the world. This is easilyshown to be palpably untrue on a superficial level— the names of denominations in Europe andNorth America are not just the same as in theUnited Kingdom - though on the next leveldown it might be discovered that denominationalsimilarities are so great that 'world confessionalbodies' can operate (see page 82). It seems not tomatter too much that some Methodists havebishops and others do not.

It is easy to ignore what William Templeidentified as 'the great new fact of this age', andto assume that church union has not affected

traditional western structures which weretransmitted to other regions. (Note that even ifthis were true, a study of Christianity wouldhave to pay attention to the Orthodox Churchesand to the oldest Eastern and SouthernChurches.) This would merely be to repeat thecomforting assumption of many within westerndenominations, which frustrates and saddenspeople working in other matrices, but for thesake of proper education the teacher should dobetter than this. A teacher in many areas couldencourage a project (perhaps at 'O' level) todiscover how Local Ecumenical Projects andunited congregations are affected by nationaldenominational (and missionary) structures.

In this century, the oldest Church unions (andwe consider only those which cross olddenominational lines) were voluntary. Beginningwith the United Church of Canada (1925) andthe series of unions (1934—57) which led to theUnited Church of Christ (USA), particular atten-tion is given to the Church of South India (1947)which is seeking further union with the Churchof North India (1970) and others; CNI and CSIwere the first to include Anglicans with otherProtestants (see also Church of Pakistan, 1970).It is worth noting that the lack of ready approvalshown by the Church of England not only madedifficulties for these united Churches but alsodiscouraged Anglicans elsewhere (this could beexplored).

Some unions could almost be described asunavoidable. The Three Self Patriotic Associa-tion in China represents the Protestants who sur-vived the cultural revolution, which attempted todestroy them, and who find the old divisions notsimply irrelevant but also dangerous (there is noclear indication of the ways in which links withthe Catholic Patriotic Association might grow).In South Arabia, a difficult and often inhospit-able environment for Christian witness, thetwenty to thirty Reformed and LutheranChristians became the Church of South Arabiain 1961.

Other unions came about as the result ofpolitical pressure — but may be none the worsefor that. During the Japanese occupation of thePhilippines the Churches were forced to federate,and although this split up in 1945, fiveprotestant denominations became The UnitedChurch of Christ in the Philippines in 1948.

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With independence and a long civil war, Zaire setout to encourage internal unity whereverpossible, and legislation to recognize only threechurches (Roman Catholic, Kimbanguist andProtestant) led to the transformation in 1970 ofthe Conseil Protestant du Congo into the Eglise duChrist au Zaire. An interesting side light from(especially) Old Testament concepts of God couldbe tested by exploring the question whetherdifferent motives for union reflect differentdegrees of validity or different methodschosen/used by God.

Christian groups committed to union have alsobeen able to contribute to a wider unity. The out-standing example in the Pacific region is possiblythe United Church of Papua New Guinea andthe Solomon Islands. Negotiations began in 1964and the United Church came into being in 1968ready to support the later creation of a newindependent state; the Preamble to the PapuaNew Guinea Constitution states 'Wishing to beguided in our lives by our worthy customs andChristian principles, we the people of Papua NewGuinea set before ourselves these goals andprinciples . . .'. On an even wider scale, thePacific Conference of Churches, the All AfricaConference of Churches and the Caribbean Con-

continued from page 75In spite of this, progress is being made in some

states, e.g., California, Massachusetts, Floridaand Texas. Many teachers are ready to includestudies of religion in their teaching of worldhistory, literature and social studies. Someexcellent educational materials are beingproduced and some of the centres of such workare achieving international recognition. Schoolprincipals and administrators are understandablynervous and in a society where a closed,authoritarian form of biblical literalism is takingsuch strident forms, they have every reason to becareful. It is a great pity that more churchleaders do not lend their support to the small butgrowing movement to introduce educational reli-gion into the American schools. It seems hard toconvince church leaders that there is anything init for them. It is perfectly true that educationalreligion in the public schools would not make thechurches stronger either institutionally orthrough increased devotion on the part of youngpeople and it is a central part of the argument for

ference of Churches all strive for reconciliationand unity in large regions divided by distance,distrust, political differences and ancientrivalries. When pupils are so often reminded ofthe Protestant/Catholic divide in Ireland and theassociated violence, the world dimension ofChristianity can be a valuable corrective.

Religious Education must be a part of thatsearch for truth which is a basic justification forall the time, energy and resources we devote toformal education, and this will affect not onlyour methods but also the content of our courses.In making our selection of material for any levelof school, we will not want to paint such aninadequate picture of Christianity (glossy ordepraved, sectarian, geographically or culturallydiminished) that it has to be unlearned later. Partof the four dimensional truth of Christianity, anessential element of the living reality whichbelongs within Religious Education, is its world-wide expression.

The Rev Harry Undy is the Christian Education Movement'sInternational Secretary who is also the Movement's advisorysecretary for Development Education. He is a former missionaryof the Council for World Mission.

His address is CEM, 2 Chester House, Pages Lane, LondonN10 1PR.

religious education in the public schools that thisshould be so. But should not the church concernitself with improvements in education and healthand politics even if there are no souls to be won?And can anyone deny that the inclusion of suchprogrammes of religious studies would do some-thing to widen the vision of the schools and tointroduce young people to just those questions oflife the absence of which from the presentcurriculum puts such a powerful argument intothe hands of the religious segregationalists?

Readers who would like to know more aboutreligious education in America should write tothe National Council on Religion and PublicEducation, 1300 Oread Avenue, Lawrence, Ks66045, U.S.A. This is a coalition of organizationsconcerned with the study of religion in publiceducation. It is concerned with 'those ways ofstudying religion which are educationallyappropriate and constitutionally acceptable to asecular programme of public education'.Individual membership costs $10.00 and subs-cribers may receive the regular bulletin.

B.J.R.E. 87

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