Obama ctiticises faith schools

Too true!

Apathy.

Parents do have the right to withdraw their children from worship. Not many do though. They can't be arsed. Same as people not being arsed to understand what secularism means, I suppose.

Bags - how many times have you and others explained what secularism means - time to give up?
Parents have the right to withdraw their children from RE and acts of worship - the obligation is on the school to provide it , not for all children to study it.

Sometimes I sing Onward Christian Soldiers. Not often though.

I'm not militant about any faith I might have.

I don't spend loads of time reading the Church Times on the net.

Actually, that's the wrong answer. It's because they care about fairness and justice. That's what secularism is for. It's not anti-religion, as you would know and understand if you thought about it properly and did a tiny bit of research as to what it means.

Same reason some people (you, for instance) are 'militant' about their faith.

Why are people so militant about their secularism?

Oh right. I did Google that the other day. Forgotten it now.

#sievebrain

Secularism isn't atheism.

I can't actually see anything wrong with any kind of faith/church schools. Grandsons go to one. It's good. They meet up with other local schools for various activities. There is no segregation!

Why are people so militant about their atheism? Live and let live I say.

#peaceman

But it is a means of establishing equality under the law for all school kids whether they are religious or not.

To be fair, speck, you'd have to allow faith schools for any faith. You can't allow C of E schools and no other kind of faith school in modern Britain. Simpler not to allow any so that everyone is equal. Parents still have the right to bring their children up in the religion of their choice, so it is not limiting.

The US is a much more religious country than the UK, and yet the spearation of church and state is written into their constitution. Not having faith schools is clearly not a means of limiting people's religious choices.

Disestablish,disestablish - the USA has it right, as do many other countries.

If you reject the idea of Faith schools you cannot call yourself a liberal in human and political terms. A `liberal`has a `live and let live` philosophy.

Faith schools are now getting a `bad name` because of religious fanatics and terrorism. But why lump all types of religious schools together and wish to ban the lot!
After all, Church of England Schools have been with us for many decades and have done a great job without any concern - until terrorism reared it ugly head.

I prefer the more enlightened secular US model. Opt out options are the devil because people (parents, that is) are too afraid or too inertto use them.

We did, by the way, but we were the only ones in spite of not being the only non-religious parents.

Jo8 - Prayer in US Schools would be unconstitutional (although obviously any individual pupils who feel the need can pray to themselves). Despite the acute religiosity of certain communities, The United States is a secular country, aand had many freethinkers among its founders.

Here, State schools are, I believe, subject to a statutory requirement for "an act of Christian worship" daily. This is seen by many as an embarrassment.

There is, I think, an opt-out available to those aged sixteen or over. My feeling is that the opt-out should be available to any pupil old enough to be confirmed...

I stand corrected. I should have said I was referring to secondary education when talking about compulsory RE but I may be wrong. I used to teach it but retired from mainstream many many years ago in favour of the much more congenial (to me ) ESOL.

No Gorki in the 21st century the Prmary National Curriculum includes Maths, English, Science, PE, ICT, History, Geograohy, Music, Art, D&T, MFL, Citizenship, etc... Can't remember it all as I retired seven year ago but it's all compulsory nowadays. And guess what? It's all change again in 2014 I believe. Usually one class teacher is responsible for delivering all the subjects, though if you're lucky the might be a music and/or specialist PE teacher around. No surprising if teachers have to use additional resources to deliver this to the standard required.

See 1944 Education Act. "Religious instruction" I believe is the only compulsory subject in UK education. Sadly it has recently been reported that a good proportion of primary school teachers now rely on the Internet to prepare their RE lessons because of their own lack of knowledge in this area.

Do any other countries apart from UK and direct colonies have assemblies in school? Certainly totally does not happen in Europe.

There is a huge difference between teaching 'about religion' as in state schools in the UK, as well as humanism and atheism (sadly rarely discussed as a valid option) and teaching 'religion'. I have absolutely no opposition to the former, but I do to the latter.

Although I think our schools are supposed to have worship, but a lot of them get round it.

I am really surprised that they don't have any prayers in US school assemblies. Thought with all that hand on heart stuff they would be well into their religion.

I guess it's like the majority of our schools - teach the facts about the various religions, but not actually worship.

Learn something new every day!

My neighbour who used to live in New Jersey said her 5 year old son said 'God Bless America Underdog! in school each morning. Being Brits it amused them as they found the hand on heart thing too much for 5 year olds anyway.