Shifting paradigms: atheization of school education in socialist Slovenia

Abstract

The paper delves into the instruments of the atheization of school education in Socialist Slovenia, drawing from an analysis of school curricula, textbooks, archival sources, and public debates on religious policy. The atheization of society in Slovenia was a gradual process that developed in the awareness that most of the population was religious and that prior to the Second World War, the Catholic Church had played a key role in Slovenian society. Similarly, yet in line with the specifics of the different regions of the Yugoslav state and the respective predominant religions, the process of atheization took place elsewhere in Yugoslavia as well. The Yugoslav constitution guaranteed freedom of religion and respect for religious rights, but defined religion as a private matter, thus rendering it irrelevant and invisible in the public sphere. At the same time, non-religiosity and atheism as the official stances of the ruling Communist Party were mediated through all areas of social life. The dialectical materialism developed into the only recognized “scientific” way of explaining the world and coping with the “ultimate questions”, while religion was considered a sign of ignorance, an illusion, and the alienation of people. The education system served as a pivotal conduit for disseminating the new ideology. On the one hand, religious education faced constraints and rigorous oversight in public schools until its removal in 1952. On the other hand, the introduction of the new school subject Moral Education emerged as the most obvious mechanism for promoting atheization within the school system.