Description

This paper emphasises the need for interfaith education as a way to promote and protect Cultural Rights. Religion today has new labels due to the uprising of religious fundamentalism that sometimes leads to terrorism and due to the new forms it has taken in many societies.

The revival of spiritual beliefs outside the spheres of institutionalised religions, the influence of other faiths in countries where religious diversity did not exist and the process of secularisation, are forces that demand interfaith education programmes for children to learn to live in plural societies.

However, interfaith education requires governments to make sure schools are arenas where the right to freedom of religion and beliefs is respected and promoted, and where there are equal opportunities for children who belong to religious minorities.