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Intercultural Education
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Religion in Greek education in a time of globalization

Ioannis Efstathiou a; Fokion Georgiadis a; Apostolos Zisimos b
a
Institute of Education, University of London, UK b Pedagogical Department of Primary Education, Aristotle
University of Thessaloniki, Greece

Online Publication Date: 01 August 2008

To cite this Article Efstathiou, Ioannis, Georgiadis, Fokion and Zisimos, Apostolos(2008)'Religion in Greek education in a time of
globalization',Intercultural Education,19:4,325 — 336
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 Intercultural Education
Vol. 19, No. 4, August 2008, 325–336

Religion in Greek education in a time of globalization

Ioannis Efstathioua*, Fokion Georgiadisa and Apostolos Zisimosb
a
Institute of Education, University of London, UK; bPedagogical Department of Primary Education,
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece
Intercultural
10.1080/14675980802376853
CEJI_A_337852.sgm
1467-5986
Original
Taylor
402008
19
000002008
and
&Article
Francis
(print)/1469-8439
Francis
Education (online)

In a great number of countries religion plays an important role in public life. As far as
Greece is concerned, it has always been a key element in public life including education.
Religious education is a compulsory subject taught in a confessional and catechist way,
while Orthodoxy saturates school culture, making the Greek educational system
intolerant towards students of different religious backgrounds. In this paper, the Greek
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case is examined against two different perspectives – the globalist perspective and that
of the sceptics.

Σε πολλές χώρες η θρησκεία διαδραµατίζει σηµαντικό ρόλο στη δηµόσια ζωή.

Óσον αϕορά την Eλλάδα θρησκεία είναι πάντα ένα βασικό στοιχείο στην
ελληνική δηµόσια ζωή συµπεριλαµβανοµένης της εκπαίδευσης. H θρησκευτική
εκπαίδευση είναι ένα υποχρεωτικό µάθηµα για τουζ ορθόδοξους µαθητές/
µαθήτριες που διδάσκονται µε έναν οµολογιακό και κατηχητικό τρόπο ενώ η
ορθοδοξία διαποτίζει το σχολικό πολιτισµό που καθιστά το ελληνικό
εκπαιδευτικό σ ν́στηµα δυσανεκτικό ως προς τους µαθητές διαϕορετικώ ν
θρησκευτικών καταβολών. Σε αυτό το κείµενο εξετάζεται η ελληνική περίπτωση
ενάντια σε δ ν́ο διαϕορετικές προοπτικές – αυτή των υποστηρικτών της
παγκοσµιοποίησης καθώς επίσης και αυτή των σκεπτικιστών.
Keywords: globalization; religious education; national identity; interculturalism; Greece

Introduction
In a great number of countries, religion plays an important role in public life. As far as
Greece is concerned, it has always been a key element in public life, including education
(Chrysoloras 2004). Even in the time of transition towards modernization in a globalizing
context, religion continues to influence Greek society, while religious education is taught in
a catechist way in primary and secondary education (Sotirelis 1998), despite the ever grow-
ing number of students coming from different religious and cultural backgrounds.
Drawing on the notion that society and education are intertwined, this paper endeavours
to investigate the reasons for the persistence of religion in contemporary educational culture
in Greece by testing the validity of two accounts concerning social responsiveness to global-
ization against Greek social reality through the analysis of the discourses of the main power
agents in Greek society, namely, political actors and parties, on the one hand, and the offi-
cially established state Church, on the other.
The first part of the paper outlines the building of Greek national identity and the way
in which it saturates Greek education today. The second part examines the influence of
religion upon Greek society and investigates the consequences of religion on attempts to

*Corresponding author. Email: io_efst@hotmail.com

ISSN 1467-5986 print/ISSN 1469-8439 online

© 2008 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/14675980802376853
http://www.informaworld.com
 326 I. Efstathiou et al.

modernize its sociopolitical structure. The third part briefly outlines the globalist account of
tradition and religion (Giddens 1995, 2002) as well as the account of the sceptics on the
formation of global culture (Green 1997). The fourth part outlines the discourses of the
Church and the political actors as well as their impact on the preservation of religion in
Greek education. The paper concludes that the account of the sceptics better suits the Greek
case.

Historical background and socioeconomic contextualization

Building Greek national identity
According to Veloudis (1999) and Chrysoloras (2004), the independence war against the
Ottomans, which ended with the establishment of the independent Greek State (Hellas) in
1830, meant the awakening of a national consciousness – that modern Greeks were
‘Hellenes’, descendants of ancient Greeks – and launched the development of Greek
historiography.
Many historians challenged the ‘Hellenic’ origin of modern Greeks at that time but Fall-
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merayer, a German historian, was the one who mostly shocked not only the Greeks but also
all those admirers of ancient Greek civilization who had seen its continuation in modern
Greeks. With his work History of the peninsula of Morea, he alleged that modern Greeks
were a mixture of Slavic tribes. A few years later, he additionally supported the extreme
theory of the ‘albanization’ of part of Greece. This fact created the need for a systematic
building of a national identity, a job that was carried out by Falmerayer’s most gifted oppo-
nent Paparrigopoulos, who became the ‘national’ historiographer of Greece. Paparrigopou-
los rejected Falmerayer’s allegations, among others, by stressing the survival of the Greek
language as his main argument and advocated the continuity of the Greek history from
prehistoric to modern times. Further, he claimed that Christian religion owes its dissemina-
tion in Europe to the Greek language and the unity of the Roman Empire, where it was
spoken. These allegations constitute the ‘New Hellenism’ framework, whereas advocates of
‘New Orthodoxy’ supported the christianization of Hellenism in Byzantium, where the
Hellenic civilization was incorporated by the new religion (Mavrogordatos 2003). There-
fore, Hellenism has survived in an undisturbed continuation through the Church and reli-
gious books that were written in Greek. However, the foundation of national identity can
only be grounded on a real, if selective, historical and cultural past (Tsoucalas 1993).
Many scholars, among them Kordatos (1999), reject the continuity of Hellenic civiliza-
tion by arguing that Byzantium in all manifestations of its political and social life had nothing
to do with ancient Greece. He alleges that it was a mosaic of people and the fact that the
Greek language was spoken in many provinces does not mean that the people had an Hellenic
consciousness. The ancient world disappeared from people’s memory some centuries after
its demolition and with the exception of some scholars the masses had only a Christian
consciousness.
According to Romanos (2001), Hellenism and Christianity are two entirely different
traditions which were unified within the framework of ‘Hellenic-Christian’ civilization.
Orthodox religious identity became the marker of Greek national identity, providing an
element of ‘togetherness’ as opposed to external threats (Mouzelis 1978; Kokosalakis
1987). The Greek Orthodox Church advocates until today the existence of a harmonious
relation between ancient philosophical and theological thinking by identifying God with the
philosophical notion of the ‘ultimate good’. Further, by incorporating and extending ancient
philosophical thought, Christianity managed to save Hellenism from Persian, Frankish and
Islamic threats, as well as to disseminate it in the West (ibid.). In fact, Romanos claims,
 Intercultural Education 327

quite the opposite happened. While Christian religion abandoned Hellenism by demolishing
monuments, destroying books and even forbidding any reference to its existence, medieval
Islam incorporated Hellenic civilization and disseminated it in Europe.
Despite the problematic relation between Orthodoxy and Hellenism, the building of a
national identity was based on the version of the continuity of the Hellenic civilization
through Byzantium within the framework of ‘Hellenic-Christian civilization’ (Alivizatos
1999; Zambeta 2000, 2003, 2005; Chrysoloras 2004) which has always constituted the
‘national truth’ ever since (Zambeta 2005). According to Skopetea (1988, 1999), the nation
has been the guardian of religion and religion has been the guardian of the nation. Since Greek
Independence from the Ottomans, the Orthodox Church has allied itself with right-wing
governments, even with the military dictatorship in Greece (1967–74) (Chrysoloras 2004).
Nowadays, the strongest advocates of this ‘national truth’ have been the Greek Orthodox
Church, the conservative political wing and the ‘Neo-Orthodoxy’ group which spans the
entire Greek political spectrum (Zambeta 2000). Within this sociopolitical context, Ortho-
dox religion as a core element of the national identity also saturates the entire educational
system.
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Religion in education
During recent decades, the rapid socio-economic restructuring of Greece has coexisted with
attempts which have been made to modernize Greek education through constructing new
curricula, installing new technology and adopting an entrepreneurial culture. Socio-
economic structures and the cultural landscape of the country have recently been influenced
by the presence of large numbers of economic immigrants. Meanwhile, religious education
and the Orthodox culture that dominates the school environment have remained unchanged.
Durkheim (1912/2001) treated religion as an authoritative yet dynamic system of social
ideals and beliefs that shape a common perception of, and therefore, life in, a society’s
moral universe. In his view, educational systems reflect underlying changes in society,
which naturally seek to reproduce those collectively held values, beliefs, norms and condi-
tions through their institutions. Education is part of the self-perpetuating national ideology
structure following more or less obvious national curriculum policies (Schleicher 1993).
The construction of a national identity, however, does not only mean the determination of
the ‘self’, it entails the complementary process of determining and excluding the ‘other’
(Dragonas 1997). The case of Greek education represents an institution, the aim of which
has always been the reproduction of a national identity (Zambeta 2005).
The constitutional recognition of Orthodoxy as the prevailing religion in the Greek State
combined with the constitutional demand for ‘the development of the national and religious
consciousness’ of Greek citizens as one of the basic aims of education (Greek Constitution
1975, art.16.2) have led to Orthodoxy being taught in schools in a monophonic and catechist
way (Sotirelis 1998). The aim of this privileged placement of Orthodoxy in education has
been the systematic assimilation of the ‘prevailing religion’ as a core element of the
‘Hellenic-Christian civilization’ way (Sotirelis 1998). The basic educational legal frame-
work (Law 1566/1985, art.1.1) provides that the school should ‘encourage the students’
loyalty to the country and faithfulness to the authentic elements of the Orthodox Christian
tradition’. Meanwhile, the oxymoronic spirit of this educational policy can be easily traced
within the same Law, when it provides the inviolability of the freedom of religious
consciousness (Zambeta 2000).
The cross-thematic curriculum framework for religious education set by the 303/
13.03.03 Ministerial Decision (Greek Pedagogical Institute 2003) aims at the acquisition of
 328 I. Efstathiou et al.

Christian faith and Eastern Christian Orthodox tradition, the promotion of Orthodox
spirituality as an individual and collective experience, the consideration of the role of Chris-
tianity in Greek and European history and culture as well as the appreciation of the role of
Christianity in improving the quality of human life.
It is obvious that such a curriculum aims at disseminating ‘religious truth’ but, in doing
so, it contradicts the multicultural character of education by excluding students of different
religious backgrounds (Sotirelis 1998; Zambeta 2000, 2003, 2005). No other religion is
taught in mainstream education with the exception of the schools of the Muslim minority in
Thrace and a few schools with Catholic students. Students can be exempted from religious
classes at the request of parents or guardians. This option is considered compatible with the
constitutional claim of religious freedom (Sotirelis 1998).
Moreover, the religious spirit saturates the entire educational process by spreading
religious messages also through other subjects such as history and Greek language in such
a way that any reference to other religions is made only through the view of Christianity and
always in contrast to the values of Orthodoxy (Sotirelis 1998; Chrysoloras 2004). Morning
collective prayer and visits to church so that religious feelings can be reinforced are still
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included in contemporary school culture (Sotirelis 1998; Chrysoloras 2004) thus widening
the gap between the ‘self’ and the ‘other’. Additionally, more opportunities for associating
religious to national identity are still offered via cultural events prepared by students. As
Coulby (2000) claims, religious teaching through cultural events can be more effective than
explicit religious teaching.
According to Zambeta (2003), religious education as it appears in school does not aim
only at studying the characteristics of Orthodoxy or promoting moral values but also at
perceiving history through a religious spectrum, a fact consistently supported by the
Church of Greece. Religious education is often transformed into history teaching by formu-
lating arguments in relation to the continuity of Hellenism and its historical meeting with
Orthodoxy, as well as by supporting the notion of preserving the Hellenic identity through
religion and the action of the clergy during the Ottoman regime. Religious education
becomes a means of socialization, the basic aim of which is the construction of a passive
citizen who accepts the disciplines and values promoted by the Church as irrefutable as
well as of one who follows the social practices set by the Church. It is interesting, there-
fore, to explore to what extent religion and modernization are contextualized within Greek
society.

Religion and modernization: Greek society in transition

It has been argued that the major part of Greek society has always been conservative and
has adhered to the Greek Orthodox Church. Orthodoxy combined the utopian forces of
religion and nationalism in a durable fusion (Chrysoloras 2004). Abela (2004) found that a
paleo-Durkheimian model prevails in Greek society, wherein people’s connection to the
sacred entails their belonging to a Church mainly coexistent with society.
According to Chrysoloras (2004), the Orthodox Church has played an active role in
supporting State decisions, national solidarity and nationalism since the foundation of the
Greek State, while religion has been frequently manifested in official public life. The
preamble of the Greek Constitution (Greek Constitution1975, art. 3) makes direct reference
to the ‘Holy and Consubstantial and Indivisible Trinity’. The president of the Greek Repub-
lic and the country’s parliamentarians are inaugurated with a religious oath in the presence
of Athens’s archbishop, who is also an honorary guest at all official governmental celebra-
tions. Even the Greek left has almost never been unequivocally hostile towards the Greek
 Intercultural Education 329

Church, while intellectuals and artists who are generally considered to belong to the left
frequently use a Helleno-Orthodox discourse (Chrysoloras 2004).
Eurobarometer (2004) indicates that the majority of the Greek citizens (61%) trust the
official Church, although this percentage slipped to 40% in 2005 according to a survey
conducted by VPRC (2005) and published in the newspaper ‘Kyriakatiki Eleftherotypia’.
This decrease in trust for the Church is due to the disclosure of various scandals associated
with high ranking clergy. According to another survey conducted by the same company and
published in the same newspaper, the vast majority of the population, regardless of political
orientation, think that religious education should remain as a compulsory subject in school.
In light of all these data, one could conclude that Greece is a conservative religious country
adhering to tradition as a pillar of national identity.
According to Chrysoloras (2004), the psychological power of a national religion is
undoubtedly gaining ground. Additionally, adherence to religion can be explained by the
kind of education all Greeks have gone through and the fact that education is part of the
self-perpetuating national ideology structure (Schleicher 1993). The role that traditionalist
curriculum plays in the formation of controlled identities is best expressed by Coulby
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(2000, 49):

School and university curricula … serve to ensure that as each individual is engaged in the
process of identity formation or reformation, a central inscription will consist in the taken-for-
granted rightness of the principles and practices of the state concerned.

Moreover, a theory developed by Gotovos (1993) on national identity and education consid-
ers the fact that Greek education has always advocated a national identity structured with
elements from the past – Hellenism and Orthodoxy – as a precautionary tactic. As he
explains, national pride could be cultivated only on the grounds of ancient grandeur due to
the lack of modern accomplishments.
However, as Patrikios (2007) claims, religiosity statistics disregard the qualitative aspect
of religious commitment. What is observed in the case of Greece is a qualitative change in
commitment rather than a religious decline. Despite the Orthodox Church’s domination of
Greek society and polity, a ‘deviant’ belief system is witnessed in State–Church relations
and citizens’ perceptions regarding religious institutions that are constructed outside Church
control. Consequently, he observes a declining religious authority within the context of
Greek State religion.
As Zambeta (2001) also claims, modernization has been the key ideological concept
which is perceived as a change of the conditions and contexts of social and political power.
In fact, the influence of the Church on State affairs started disintegrating in the beginning
of the 1980s when the centre-left ‘Panhellenic Socialist Movement’ (PASOK) came to
power. Since its election in office in 1981, and the entrance of Greece in the European
Union (EU), PASOK has attempted to introduce secularization and modernization measures
in Greece (Chrysoloras 2004). Unlike their conservative predecessors, the 1981–87 PASOK
governments advocated policies that aimed to shape a more secularized society (Georgiadou
1995) (including policies introducing civil marriage, divorce by mutual consent, and greater
lenience toward prosecution for adultery, legitimization of abortion). These governments
also tried to loosen catechism and modernize the curriculum by introducing Darwin’s evolu-
tion theory into education. The Church protested strongly against the intrusion of atheist and
materialistic ideology (Sotirelis 1998). Additionally, in November 1998, the Council of
State issued a decision forcing the Greek Ministry of Education to lift restrictions on
appointment of non-Orthodox teachers at single-class elementary school. Consequently,
 330 I. Efstathiou et al.

Law no. 1771/1998 authorized the appointment of non-Orthodox teachers in public elemen-
tary schools and in nurseries if they met the formal requirements. The relationship between
the Church and the State further deteriorated when the dynamic Archbishop Christodoulos
became head of the Greek Church in 1998. Christodoulos, by making use of his personal
popularity, the strong attachment of the Greeks to the Orthodox dogma, as well as his
rhetorical and leadership capabilities, seemed unwilling to make any further concessions to
the State (Chrysoloras 2004). When the Socialist government announced its intention to
exclude the reference to religion from the identity cards in May 2000, the Church fiercely
reacted and asked for a referendum to decide on the issue (Molokotos-Liederman 2003,
2007a, 2007b; Stavrakakis 2005). The government refused, and Christodoulos started a
struggle, which included street demonstrations, media appearances and the collection of
signatures in favour of a referendum. It was reported by the Church that it had managed to
collect more than three million signatures. The conflict between the Church and the State
on the identity cards issue ended on 29 August 2001, with the intervention of the President
of the Republic, who turned down the demands of the Church for a referendum, on the basis
that this was an action against the provisions of the Constitution (Chrysoloras 2004). Thus,
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this modernizing step was finally implemented. The abolition of the inscription of religious
affiliation on identity cards was based on the Privacy Protection Law (2472/1997), which
prohibited the inclusion of personal and sensitive data on state documents. Based on the
same law was also the Decision 77A/2002 of the Independent Authority on the Protection
of Personal Data regarding the abolition of reference to religion on school certificates.
According to the last Eurobarometer survey (2007), most Greek citizens think that their
country has benefited from the EU, desire a European constitution, support the political
unity of the EU, and demand acceleration of its integration. Only a small percentage (17%)
of the Greek population is afraid that the EU will lead to the loss of cultural identity. As far
as globalization is concerned, Greeks share positive views regarding reforms (76%),
competitiveness (73%), free trade (66%) and liberalization (54%), while at the same time
they take a strongly negative standpoint, 71% stating that globalization brings to mind
something negative. These results clearly show that Greek citizens are happy with the EU,
while their stance towards globalization is ambivalent.
Therefore, the question arises as to why religion persists in education where a large
number of students, economic immigrants mostly, do not adhere to the Greek Orthodox
dogma, despite the continuous attempts to modernize the economic and sociopolitical
structures in contemporary Greece. While school curricula in Greece are controlled by the
State and it is taken for granted that social, political and religious interests are represented
in the formation of school knowledge (Coulby 2000), this paper tries to answer the above-
mentioned question by testing Greek social reality against two theories on social respon-
siveness to globalization, the one by Giddens regarding the globalist position, and that of
Green regarding the position of the sceptics.

Two accounts on social responsiveness to globalization

Giddens (1995) claims that, in pre-modern cultures, tradition located in various social insti-
tutions, among which religion had a leading place, was ‘a prime source of authority’. In
such cultures, the dominant dogma left little space for religious alternatives, and submission
to religious authorities could be understood as a consequence of unpredictable daily life:

Religious authorities in particular quite often cultivated the feeling that individuals were
surrounded by threats and dangers – since only the religious official was in a position to be able
either to understand or to seek successfully to control these. (Giddens 1995, 195)
 Intercultural Education 331

In a globalized society, as he further argues, ‘religion not only refuses to disappear but it
undergoes resurgence’ (Giddens 1995) for reasons that have to do with uncertainty and
doubt caused by modernity. Individuals face a dilemma of authority versus doubt, but there
is a basic contrast with pre-modern societies: ‘Forms of traditional authorities now become
“authorities” among others, part of an indefinite pluralism of expertise’ (Giddens 1995).
In this case, the expert is quite different from the authority in that authority becomes
essentially equivalent to specialist advice.
Furthermore, in Giddens’s (2002) view, fundamentalism as a response to novel circum-
stances is identified with traditions – and among them religion – defended in the globalization
process: ‘Fundamentalism has no time for ambiguity, multiple intersection or multiple
identity – it is a refusal of dialogue in a world whose peace and continuity depend on it’
(Giddens 2002, 49).
Fundamentalism revitalizes the guardians of tradition such as the clergy who gain secu-
lar as well as religious power either by taking over the government directly, as is the case
of Iran, or by collaborating with political parties.
In contrast, Green (1997) claims that cosmopolitanism is a very uneven phenomenon
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and challenges the globalist arguments within the cultural realm. While globalists advocate
the dissemination of a global culture due to the rapid development of communication tech-
nologies that cannot be controlled by governments, Green alleges that responses to cultural
globalization can be different, depending on the political forces in any given state.

For the foreseeable future, it would seem that there will continue to be a dichotomous pattern
of increasing cultural globalisation inducing deepening cosmopolitanism in some states and
escalating cultural nationalism in others. The different responses depend to a large degree on
the political forces in any given state. (Green 1997, 165)

The role of the State may be changing, but internationalization does not reduce the scope or
importance of its functions concerning external and internal relations. However, the powers
of the State have not necessarily been weakened by the growth of supranational agencies:
‘The rise of the European Union for instance has led to near hysterical reactions from Euro-
sceptics and nationalists who fear the erosion of national autonomy and identity’ (Green
1997, 166).
In the long run, central governments in EU member countries have increased their
strategic control considerably in areas such as education and health, while the nation-state
still constitutes the guarantee for social cohesion and solidarity.
As one can see from the first reference to Giddens (1995), he describes two different social
states, a pre-modern one and a globalized one. Although in Greek society religious authority
is quite conspicuous, claiming to possess the expertise for helping people face existing and
invented threats effectively, it would be oversimplifying to accept that Greek society is a
pre-modern one. Greece has been a member of the EU for many years and has been in a
period of transition towards modernizing its economic, political and cultural structures. Addi-
tionally, one could not seriously contend that Greek society is in a state of high modernity,
as Giddens understands it – a society where religious authorities are just authorities among
others deprived of their old power. The Greek Church has a prominent position, exerting
considerable influence on people.
Moreover, although fundamentalism could appear in a period of transition, as Giddens
(2002) alleges, this presupposes generalized spontaneous hostility of society against Euro-
peanization and globalization. However, such a tendency is not observable in Greece.
Greek society is susceptible to conservative attitudes and, for various reasons devoted to
the idea of national identity, a combination of history, language and religion as distinctive
 332 I. Efstathiou et al.

components of Greekness, but under no circumstances are Greeks hostile to Europeanization

or globalization. However, some politicians and clergy have made themselves guardians of
the supposedly threatened national identity and have devoted themselves to protecting it by
all means, including by keeping religious education in the schools. Although present Greek
social reality rather matches the account of the sceptics, it remains to be seen whether its
resistance to submitting itself to a uniform global culture will endure.
The next section analyses this educational reality by investigating the discourses of the
two major power agents –the Greek Orthodox Church and the political actors.

The power exerting agents and their discourses

In Greece, it is taken for granted that school curricula should be controlled by the State and
the ultimate say regarding the content of textbooks rests with the Ministry of National
Education and Religions (Coulby 2000). Religious authorities, in fact the Church of Greece,
claim the right to comment on and control school knowledge.
According to the Greek constitution, the State and the Church are not separate, but their
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roles are distinct (Sotirelis 1998). Despite its distinct role, the Church has always intervened
in matters of the State, while education is included among its main interests (Zambeta
2003). The slightest effort to change the religious culture in education has caused protest
among religious leaders (Zambeta 2003), because this would endanger the discourse and
power of the Church. The main points of the Church’s discourse during the Christodoulos
period have been: (a) the Church is the only protector of Greek national identity, as the State
is becoming increasingly detached from the idea of the nation; (b) membership of the EU,
in the absence of a strong Church, is potentially dangerous for Greek national identity; and
(c) secularization measures in Greece are irrelevant and illegitimate (Chrysoloras 2004).
For the wide acceptance of the discourse of the Church by society, the preservation of
religion in education is thus considered necessary. Therefore, when the present Conservative
Government raised the matter of new constitutional reform, the leader of the Greek Orthodox
Church Archbishop Christodoulos stated that he could agree to a ‘velvet’ separation between
State and Church, but under no circumstances would he accept the abolition of religious
education in schools. The reasons are obvious. Although religious teaching has been unsuc-
cessful in reproducing fervent Christian beliefs, it has performed far more effectively in
legitimizing versions of history and tradition as well as in reproducing values such as virtue,
family, respect, continuity and authority (Coulby 2000).
Since 1998, when the archbishop was elected by the Holy Synod, the Church has chal-
lenged the distinct roles of the State and itself, and multiplied interventions in political
matters by bitterly criticizing governments and scholars and by publicly expressing its
opinion on international matters (Kontogiorgis 2000). This new role is deemed compatible
with the word of God and, within this framework, the Church appears to be the institutional
guardian of Orthodoxy and the Greek nation (Kontogiorgis 2000).
According to Archbishop Christodoulos (1997), the relation between Orthodoxy and
Hellenism is exactly like the relation between Siamese twins, and therefore its separation
can cause irreparable damages. He further defends the compulsory and catechist character
of religious education, because it contributes to the development of the orthodox conscious-
ness of Greek students and warns against assimilation of Hellenism by the West. European
integration, he stresses, is dangerous because national identities are abolished, therefore
action must be taken so that Hellenism will not disappear. Further, globalization harms tradi-
tions and religions and, since politicians are reluctant to take any action to save Hellenism,
it is the Church that has to stand up against the modern world.
 Intercultural Education 333

By accusing politicians of being the ‘Trojan horse’ of Europe, the clergy considers itself
the authentic representative of citizens (Kontogiorgis 2000). In this way, the latter become
members of the Church, who follow religious leaders rather than elected governments. So,
if the citizens act like members of the Church, politicians will have to ask for the Church’s
approval before they take any action and obey the clergy in order to gain legitimacy
(Kontogiorgis 2000).
Although modernization in Greece has dominated the political discourse of the latest
PASOK governments, it has been greeted with scepticism not only among right wing
politicians, but also among the socialists who initiated it (Zambeta 2001). For these politi-
cians, while modernization has been positive in the sense that it linked Greece with western
political and economic culture, the preservation of national identity has always been a
highly respected value (Kontogiorgis 2000).
The main points, hence, of the politicians’ discourse have been: (a) modernization poli-
cies should be tempered due to the influence of the Church over society; (b) Orthodox faith
is a major element of Greek cultural identity; and (c) there is a risk of political cost that
modernization attempts might cause in the event of a Church–State conflict.
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Through the ensuing dispute with the Church, PASOK realized that the Church had a
strong influence over society and that Orthodox faith is a basic component of the nation’s
cultural identity (Georgiadou 1995). The party thus compromised and tempered its policy.
These examples of a strong link between faith and nationalistic discourse have thus given
the impression that, both in its official and popular forms, ‘Orthodoxy … sanctifies the
socio-political Greek system’ (Makrides 1991, 68) and the State ‘manipulate[s] Orthodoxy
as part of the political-cultural project of nation-building’ (Prodromou 1994, 128).
Indicative of the eventual political cost for PASOK, which took some modernizing
steps, are the alliances of the Church with the oppositional right-wing parties. After the
abolition of the reference to religion on identity cards, Christodoulos asked the ‘Nea
Democratia’ party to commit itself to bringing back the optional inclusion of religious affil-
iation on the cards, (Molokotos-Liederman 2003, 2007a, 2007b), this in exchange for his
unofficial support. This commitment, however, was never fulfilled by New Democracy
when it came to office.
Additionally, during the local elections of 2002 in Athens, the Church implicitly supported
the extreme right-wing party, LAOS (Laïkós Orthódoxos Synagermós, Popular Orthodox
Rally or The People’s Orthodox Rally). The result of the Church’s support for LAOS was
that a party whose percentages rarely reached above 3%, managed to get a staggering 14%
during the 2002 elections in the prefecture of Athens and Piraeus (Chrysoloras 2004).
The issue of the eventual separation of Church and State also cost the last PASOK
Government. According to Simitis (2005), the former prime minister, although the separation
of State and Church was the intention of his government, could not achieve constitutional
reform in 2001 due to the lack of consensus and opposition from the Church and large parts
of Greek society, as well as of many MPs from all parts of the political spectrum.
It is apparent that a peculiar kind of religious fundamentalism is supported by conserva-
tive politicians in present Greek society. The increasing mobility of the clergy in defence of
the ‘endangered nation’ and Orthodoxy, as well as the rhetoric against European integration
and globalization, betrays anxiety regarding the future of the Church within Greek society.
According to Coulby (2000), misunderstanding the nature of transitions and the resistance
to them have led states to consolidate traditionalist and modernist elements within school
curricula in such a way that they are both unsuited to the needs of the knowledge economy
and destructive to democratic pluralism. Hence, in the case of Greece, according to the
discourses of the Church and the politicians, religion should not be abolished from
 334 I. Efstathiou et al.

education, because this might decrease the influence of religion over society and, if the EU
promotes religious neutrality in education, this can harm the Orthodox Church and,
consequently, the nation. In its effort to preserve its power and privileges, the Church takes
advantage of religiosity in Greek society to influence politicians while at the same time the
latter use the Church to accomplish political gains.

Conclusions
The notion of different national responses to global culture supported by Green seems to be
applicable in the case of Greece. Since globalization in the realm of politics cannot be demon-
strated, as he argues, the different responses depend on the political forces in any given state.
Moreover, educational systems still attempt to serve national needs under the control of
national states. Finally, reactions from Euro-sceptics and nationalists, fearing erosion of
national autonomy and identity can result from the growth of supranational agencies. In other
words, according to Green, religion persists in Greek education not because of a generalized
religious fundamentalism which lingers within Greek society as a spontaneous opposition
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to EU, but because of the conservative nationalist culture that is still promoted by the clergy
and a substantial part of the political spectrum.
What Giddens alleges is not applicable in the Greek case, because Greeks are happy
with the EU, while a qualitative change in commitment to religion as well as a deviant belief
system is witnessed in State–Church relations. Under these circumstances, nobody could
seriously contend that there has been a spontaneous generalized opposition to the EU in the
form of religious fundamentalism within Greek society and that the protection of the
national identity by society has taken the form of a fundamentalist movement against euro-
peanization or globalization.
Greece is in a period of transition trying to modernize its economic, social, political and
cultural structure. Within this context, the clergy and conservative politicians who support
the Church and deny secularization measures in the name of the national identity under no
circumstances would accept the abolition of religion in education. The reason is that wide
acceptance of the discourse of the Church by society demands the preservation of religion
in education as a necessary condition. They probably fear that without the assimilative
power of education, national identity will fade and that they might eventually lose their
traditional control over society.
In contrast, progressive politicians who promoted the modernization of the economic
and sociopolitical structure of Greek society tempered modernizing policy and did not
forward secularization measures any further. They obviously feared that the influence of the
Church over society could harm their political future. By doing so, however, they ignored
the will of a large number of progressive citizens who challenge the authority of the Church
as well as the fact that the influence of the Church is slowly waning.

Notes on contributors
Ioannis Efstathiou (MA in Econ) studied Economics at the Athens University of Economics. He
worked in the Commercial Bank of Greece as an economist and since 2001 as a teacher in secondary
education in Greece and Germany. He speaks English, German, Spanish and French. He has partici-
pated as a presenter in international congresses. At the moment he is attending Doctoral studies at the
Institute of Education in London.

Fokion Georgiadis (MA in CompEdu) studied Pedagogy and Psychology at the Universities of
Rhodes and Athens and has worked as a primary school teacher since 1988 in Greece and Britain. He
 Intercultural Education 335

participated in many conferences in Greece and abroad and authored intercultural educational mate-
rial for the University of Athens and Crete. At the moment he attends the Doctoral School of Educa-
tion in the Institute of Education in London. He is a member of the IAIE (International Association
of Intercultural Education).

Apostolos Zisimos (MA in PrEdu) studied Pedagogy at the Universities of Thessalia and Athens. He
worked as a primary school teacher since 1985 in Greece and Britain. He participated in various
conferences on education in Greece and abroad. He co-operated with the University of Crete on the
‘Education of the Greek Diaspora’ programme (E.DIA.M.M.E). In 2005 he completed his postgrad-
uate studies at the Brunel University in London on Primary Education. At the moment, he is reading
for his doctorate at the University of Thessaloniki on Cinematography and Intercultural Education.
He is a member of the IAIE (International Association of Intercultural Education).

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