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…

Many Western historians, cultural and literary critics have viewed travel and exploration as purely western. This total exclusion of Arabo-Islamic travel has been done to demonstrate the Western sense of modernity and cultural superiority over the constructed weak "other". However, Moroccans, Arabs and Muslims in general have been…

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…

Thinking sexuality education and religion together often results in antagonisms that pit religious and secular values against each other. Political theology provides new insights into this tendency by showing how modern concepts of political legitimacy are based on secularised Christian theology. Neoliberal schooling, public sexual health and…

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…

This paper examines the complex relationship between the state, civil society and education through comparative research with young people in France and the UK. Survey data derived from two cohorts of school students in South Wales and Lyon reveal strong differences in their levels of civic and political participation. While our Welsh students…

Objectives: To examine the effect of spirituality and spiritual training on resilience in primary caregiver parents of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Methods: A cross-country pre- and post-test-based experimental design has been used. The sample of this one-year-long study comprised 1687 parents of children with ASD in 15…

Nurses are expected to provide spiritual care to patients. Even though standards provided by accreditation organizations, national nursing organizations, and the national RN licensure examination outline the expectation that nurses are to offer spiritual care to patients, the provision of spiritual care is often limited owing to time constraints…

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…

Fénelon and Voltaire, the two French philosophers and pedagogues, influenced a wide range of people in the 17th and 18th centuries in Europe. The philosophers who followed were inspired by their work which contained ideological hints and promoted humanitarian awareness. We followed the historical analysis method, we intend to present through…

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.…

Although much overlooked by both sociologists and educators, Emile Durkheim's "The Evolution of Educational Thought" ("EET"; lectures from 1904-1905) not only provides extended insight into the developmental flows and disjunctures of Western education and scholarship from the classical Greek era to Durkheim's own time but also…