A new curriculum for the teaching of religious education (RE) in Northern Irish schools will be developed following a Supreme Court judgement which found it breached human rights law.
New guidance to make parents’ withdrawal of children from RE and collective worship ”straightforward, stigma-free and supported” has also been introduced. The guidance comes into effect immediately and formal inspection of RE must take place across all schools.
Announcing the changes on Tuesday, Northern Ireland’s Minister for Education, the DUP’s Paul Givan, said there were no plans to current arrangements for collective worship in schools. Christianity would remain “central” to the syllabus, he confirmed.
“Given our historical, cultural and legal foundations, it is right that Christianity continues to provide the core focus for RE in Northern Ireland,” said Givan.
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Last year, the Supreme Court upheld a judgment by a lower court that religious education and Christian worship were not conveyed in an “objective, critical and pluralistic manner” and amounted to “indoctrination”, therefore breaching the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
At primary school, the RE curriculum in Northern Ireland is exclusively focused on Christianity, with students taught about other world religions only at post-primary level.
The case was brought by a pupil at a Belfast primary school and her father, who did not wish his daughter “to be taught that Christianity was an absolute truth”. He contended that to remove her from RE and collective worship would have been stigmatising.
A review of the RE curriculum will now begin, led by Prof Noel Purdy, director of research and scholarship at Stranmillis University College, Belfast, and Joyce Logue, former principal of Long Tower Primary School in Derry. They will be supported by an “expert drafting group” of teachers from all sectors.
There will also be “extensive engagement” with churches, teachers, school leaders, parents and young people.
Givan said the review will “develop a revised RE syllabus that is academically robust, modern in outlook and fully consistent with the Supreme Court judgment”. He anticipated it would be implemented from September 2027.
Describing it as an “opportunity to strengthen RE as an academic discipline”, he said “useful and enriching knowledge of Christianity and more widely, the world’s main religious and philosophical traditions, studied with academic rigour, will be the ambition of the new syllabus”.
He said while the review proceeds, “it is important that schools deliver religious education in a way that complies with the current law".
Givan added: “The Supreme Court was clear that RE can continue to be taught lawfully if schools ensure that additional, objective, critical and pluralistic material is included alongside the existing core syllabus.
“Together, these measures represent a balanced and measured response to the Supreme Court judgment."
Boyd Sleator, the Northern Ireland co-ordinator for Humanists UK, welcomed the announcement that the curriculum “will no longer be controlled by the four largest Christian churches, but will now be subject to a full review led by education professionals”.
Sleator said: “This is the right step forward to making sure young people are given a broad, balanced and pluralistic RE, and we look forward to engaging with the review process."
However, he added: “While the announced changes to collective worship are also welcome, changes to the withdrawal process only go so far in resolving the wider issue. The Supreme Court was clear that withdrawal was insufficient and in our view, a full review of the requirement is still needed.”
