Politics and Christian Religious Education

ABSTRACT

The article is about a discussion on the relationship between politics and Christian religious education. This article is beginning with two basic assumptions: 1) All religions lie in political system and structure; therefore, 2) religious education should not be value-free, but political. It says that in any cases, religion cannot be separated from political situation, dealing with issues about human predicaments and rights. In this perspective, therefore, Christian religious education among the other religious educations is suggested as an alternative way to resolve them educationally. For this, the writer explains first of all what the political theology is and how the church has developed it in the Korean political situations. In particular, he shows that there has been three types of political theology and education in the Korean Church history. That is, (1) a type of separation between politic and religion, (2) of religious resistance against politic, and (3) of synergic relationship between two. Then introducing Thomas Groome s approach to Christian religious education for peace and justice, as a conclusion the writer suggests inter-religious dialogue for social commitment educationally as well as spiritually.