Because it has experienced a process of secularisation for more than three centuries, France can be considered as a laboratory of the relevance of faith in a society for which it is no longer the cultural matrix. By showing how the central question of secularisation is in fact that of the relationship between faith and culture, this article…

In the course of the institutionalisation of modern school systems, the originally confessional schooling sector was largely transformed into a system regulated by public law, a process which is interpreted as secularisation. In a historical-comparative analysis, the secularisation paths of the classical educational nations England and France are…

Religious matters have traditionally been considered as a sensitive subject in French state schools. Since 1989 and the first 'Muslim headscarf affair', faith-related conflicts in those institutions have been the subject of a relatively opaque counting policy. Mobilising several state institutions- which alternatively cooperate or compete- this…

France's secular political culture, Catholic heritage, and tumultuous relationship with Islam have had a significant impact on 21st-century interpretations, perceptions, and politicisations of religious education in French society. Since religious education is relegated to the French private school system, it is decentralised, complex, and vastly…

Today, the term 'global' has become a pervasive description of universities that aim to alleviate their importance and reach. The global looks inherently big. By relating to a spherical shape it attributes size in two distinct ways: it signifies the comprehensive and extensive reach of a theme or issue as well as the spherical centrality of an…

This paper presents an innovative analytical model of Ethics Education, and uses it to analyze the major learning components found in England's National framework for religious education (NFRE). The model is based on research on Ethics Education in French­-speaking countries but can be used to characterize Ethics Education within any specific…

The objective of this research is to describe the practice of mindful leadership at the IABS - Plum Village Buddhist Monastery Upper Hamlet, France, looking at the abbot's pattern and role in developing and managing the Institute of Advanced Buddhist Studies and the monastery. This research uses the approach of qualitative research with the method…

This article explores and analyzes private Muslim schooling in France using ethnographic research performed in 2013-2014 in Lille-, Lyon-, and Paris-based Muslim schools. The article discusses the course content and the interpretations of Islam that are taught, demonstrating how French republican values are fused together with Islam to promote a…

A strong current in contemporary Catholic thought -- the theology of interreligious or interfaith dialogue -- stresses the importance of dialogue and collaboration with followers of other world faiths. This article proposes that religious education in Catholic schools, particularly at post-primary level, needs to engage more with this theological…

Education was an instrument in Christian missions' and colonial powers' civilisation projects. At the same time, education was also instrumental in fostering opposition. This article approaches perceptions of education mainly from the perspective of Norwegian Lutheran missionaries in French colonial Madagascar during the 1940s. The focus is on how…

Christianity is one of the cultural and ethical cornerstones of Europe. In the European Union (EU) there is no overarching policy on religious education (RE) in the school system. The authors use a comparative methodology to analyze the constitutions of Western European countries in relation to different aspects of RE. Specifically, it is focused…

The effects of secularisation on society demand a rethinking of the identity and mission of Catholic schools in France. In 2013, the French bishops published a new directory which offers new approaches, described here, based on the three challenges facing Catholic education in France: linking social responsibility and evangelisation, setting up…

In this article, we analyse changes in the contemporary management of private Catholic schools under State contract in France since the 1980s. Writing from a "policy sociology" perspective, we use data from previous studies on policy and on public and private schools as well as from an ongoing research project comparing policies of…

Based on a one-year longitudinal experimental study with 3,782 kindergarten school children across 15 countries, this article examines the association between prayer and happiness. Results show that the post-test scores on the faces scale were higher for the participant group who had taken the prayer lessons vis-à-vis the comparison group.…

Drawing on key incident analysis of classroom transcripts from Bashkortostan, France, North Korea, and Suriname, this article discusses the relationship between an increasingly canonical content of education and the discursive organization of teaching processes at the expense of both teachers' and students' voice. It argues that canonical…