The Encounter between Religions: Implications for Official Guidelines, Textbooks and Teacher Training

Abstract

In the material sent out inviting people to the conference which this issue of BJRE documents, participants were asked to consider what contribution could be made by theories drawn from the field of education, or in the practical work that goes on in education in schools and churches, to the task of charting ‘an ecumenical course between fanaticism about truth and neglect of truth’, as Hans Kung has put it.1 In his opening paper, Karl Ernst Nipkow elaborated this challenge very thoroughly in relation to Christian education and nurture. Here in the concluding paper I would like to take up the challenge by focussing on the work that needs to be done in three areas in particular: in producing (as is customary in the German education system) official guidelines for classroom practice, in producing new textbooks, and in training our teachers. We need both a global perspective and also some reflection on the immediate steps to be taken along the path to facing up to our world‐wide responsibilities. Let me then ...