THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIAN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN AN ERA OF SHRINKING TRANSCENDENCE

This article seeks to understand religious education as a process of communal endeavor that prioritizes and considers the learning experience intrinsically connected to its social and cultural contexts. Two authors will be of help to develop this pursuit: Lev Vygotsky, whose work emphasizes learning as constructed through interactions and in collaboration with members of a community, and Victor Turner who identifies the potential for creativity and transformation within the concepts of liminality and communitas. The article concludes by suggesting that when a community acknowledges the multiple zones of proximal development—which creates opportunities of mutual support and democratic participation—communitas surfaces as a sign of liminal vitality, openness, and solidarity.     

THE PRESENT OPPORTUNITY AND RESPONSIBILITY OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

(The Revised Standard Version of the Bible is ten years old. During this period it has been tested in every conceivable way: by the scholars, by use in all kinds of worship, by classes in church‐related educational programs, by students in colleges and theological schools. It has proven itself a valid translation and a means of proclaiming the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. It has had widespread use in Roman Catholic colleges. It is now appearing in many new editions as other publishers are being licensed to print it. To Luther A. Weigle and his teams of devoted translators we give our grateful thanks. ‐‐ Ed.)     

THE TASK OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

The way one conceives the nature of the educational process and practices it will depend to a large degree upon just exactly how one understands the nature of the person to be educated     

THE IMAGERY OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Communities of faith express in their worship the values and assumptions that shape their worldview. When those values and assumptions contradict or are in conflict with the values and assumptions of the surrounding culture, the act of worship can become an occasion for resistance against the hegemonic domination of that culture. Worship in the context of congregational life awakens peoples discontent, fosters skepticism toward prevailing assumptions, clarifies contradictions at the heart of the community's discontent, articulates ethical alternatives, and develops readiness for struggle and change. This research inquires into whether and how a congregation as a worshiping community functions as a community of resistance against the assumptions of modernity.