The debate over whether Berlin schools should offer classes on religion as an alternative to ethics courses is “only partly about how God fits into the classroom; it is also about how Muslims fit into Berlin”:
What everyone shares is an obsession with Muslims, who account for over half the students in parts of the city. The ethics course is partly meant to snuff out incipient violent radicalism. But it leaves many children learning the Koran from teachers who have little stake in German society. Better, says Pro-Reli [the movement supporting next month’s referendum on the whether to offer courses in religion], to bring it into school, where German-speaking teachers can impart Islam under the state’s watchful eye.
That Pro-Reli has got so far is a success in a city one sociologist calls “the world capital of atheism”. Some 60% of Berliners profess no religion, a tendency stronger in the ex-communist east than in the bourgeois west. Even if Pro-Reli wins a majority, the referendum will fail unless a quarter of the 2.4m-strong electorate says yes. Teaching of religion in schools may be undone by sloth, not atheism.
Read the full article in The Economist.