Religious Education and Human Rights in Europe:Focusing on the Cases of Belgium and the Netherlands

Although the European convention for the protection of human rights guarantees both the freedom of religion and the freedom of education, more and more people are claiming that the secular bias present in the education systems of most European countries puts constraints on the experience of religion by students in secondary education. The most notable example is the ban on the wearing of headscarves, which is seen as an infringement of religious freedom by some. While the “headscarves” issue is the most studied problem in connection with human rights and secondary education in Europe, it is in fact peripheral to the problem of “religious education” itself. This article argues that debates on human rights and religious education should take into consideration the historical development of “religious education” in Europe; Belgium and the Netherlands are taken as representative examples for the purposes of this study. Although most constitutions of European countries regard education as a secular matter to be organized by the state, in fact countries such as Belgium and the Netherlands allow religious institutions to organize education. These faith-based schools thus provide “religious education,” meaning the inculcation of a religion’s values. In Belgium, state schools also organize “religious education” classes aimed at children whose parents want their children to be educated in a particular tradition; any religious tradition, from Buddhism to Zoroastrianism, has to be catered for. Moreover, in Belgium Catholic schools can provide classes in Islam in case the schools are located in areas with many Muslim families. Thus there are not many problems as far as the provision of religious education is concerned, but problems do arise when religions are perceived to cross the established boundaries. As long as religions are taken to be a matter of personal faith, religious practice can be easily confined to the zone of “religious education,” but if they are seen as a way of life that is carried over into other parts of the curriculum or the school fabric, then problems do arise. While no major changes are on the horizon to the traditional “religious education” model, two trends are noted: one is the trend toward strengthening the religious character of faith-based schools; and one is towards breaking out of the “religious education” model in favor of “education about religions,” in which students do not learn only about their own faith but also about other’s.