Does RE Work?

The author re-focuses on his empirical research, whose findings were that a differentiated set of factors boosted pupil motivation in religious education: pupils valued opportunities for dialogues with different religious traditions and with one another, in so far as these dialogues built existential or ethical interest or were personally significant. Based on these findings, religious education should adopt a multi-dimensional treatment of different religious traditions and proceed on a democratic basis where pupil response and religious materials have equal significance and pupils’ citizenship competences are built up. These findings are addressed to those of the Does RE Work? project, which diagnosed UK religious education as compromised by several contradictions (including narrowing examination pressures, reluctance to deal with the sacred and bland caricatures of religions). The author concludes that religious education could work, and that the liberal democratic model of a dialogue with difference contains positive ways forward.