Profiling and Enhancing Religious Education in Catholic Schools

Abstract

Two sources inform these reflections on religious education in Catholic schools in Melbourne, Australia. The first source is a post-Conciliar theology of revelation and the second is the Enhancing Catholic School Identity (ECSI) research undertaken over the past decade by the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) under the auspices of the Catholic Education Commission of Victoria, Australia. The research question driving this study is: How can religious education in an Australian Catholic school respond to increasing student diversity in ways that are illuminated by a post-conciliar theology of revelation and by findings from the ECSI research? Part One of the study regards the ECSI research instruments through the lens of a Vatican II understanding of revelation. The implications of Part One for religious education are then considered in Part Two of the study. The method used to develop Part One of the chapter was a documentary analysis of relevant magisterial documents and key reports from the ECSI research. Part Two of the chapter was developed from a series of semi-structured interviews of religious educators whose practice exemplified the characteristics presented in Part One.