The recently posthumously published memoirs of Dr. Slobodan Tomović on the “Civil War in Montenegro 1941–1945” abound with descriptions of the troubles that befell these regions from the ideological fratricidal conflict between the monarchists and the Bolsheviks. Occupation, hatred, betrayal, treachery… In the sea of shocking memoirs, one darkly humorous episode stands out in particular, where the young Tomović, together with several other detainees, in one of the post-war communist prisons in the north of Montenegro, is tortured with electric shocks day and night. The worst of all, the respected philosopher and later Minister of Religion in the Government of Montenegro recalls, was that they were tortured by “unprofessional and completely untrained people”! It’s nice that one doesn’t know what’s worse, when you are persecuted and mistreated by those who know exactly what and how they are doing, or by those who have no idea about that job. And they think they are working (for) good.
Well, that's roughly how this recent media and political snarl at the very mention of "introducing religious education" into Montenegrin schools seems to me. It is completely legitimate for someone, taking all the arguments "for" and "against", to ultimately take the position that such a subject has no place in the school system. Just as it is equally legitimate for such a negative stance against religious education to be over-the-top in a democratic procedure by those who do not think the same. But it is neither legitimate nor reasonable, without elementary argumentation, to declare a proposal on religious education a social disaster. And even more so, while trying to give the resistance an intellectual appearance, to say that religious education (theology = the science of God, almost a synonym) is "oxymoron” – a combination of mutually exclusive terms. It is less important who said it, what is more important is that such a view of religious education has received an almost choral interpretation in the Montenegrin media these days. Because, if these two terms (faith and science) are mutually exclusive, what more is there to talk about some kind of “religious education” here in our country?
However, this is not the case. The aforementioned, less well-known word "oxymoron" is a noun (a British toponym) that sounds similar. OxfordIn that place there is one of the oldest universities in the West, which – like most others – was founded by the church (12th century, and earlier…), as evidenced by the motto of this university, which reads: "The Lord is my light"! To the fact that the origin of this prestigious scientific institution today is ecclesiastical, we add another fact that with all the historical changes of the University of Oxford (from the Roman Catholic era, through the Protestant-Anglican, and then the extremely rationalist, all the way to today...), we still have theology studies there today. Yes, theology. And this transparent truth is certainly related to the following: in the United Kingdom, religious education or religious teaching (science, teaching, learning, understanding, teaching) is not an "oxymoron" but a legally mandatory school subject. It does not have to be, and can be, confessional, and it is not a mere sociological observation of the phenomenon of religion, but an introduction to Christian culture and ritual (which is carried out precisely in schools, because teaching can begin with a prayer to God). Schools are autonomous in determining the method of implementation. In addition, there is a significant presence of religious (Catholic and Anglican) schools there.
Therefore, when we speak in principle about the phenomenon of religious instruction (religious education), we must, out of pure intellectual decency, decide between Oxford and oxymoron. Especially in Montenegro, where we have a tradition of statehood and culture that is at least as old as the British one. And our state-cultural continuity is just as imbued with a religious element as in Britain. There are two differences. The first: the Christian denomination there and here; and the second: they did not have the rule of communism, and we – thanks to them – did. But neither difference can disrupt our engagement with the basic concepts of European culture, and one of them is religious education.
Now, the issue of introducing religious education in state schools in Montenegro, the Serbian Orthodox Church does not want to run hastily or at any cost. It is in the church's interest that such a topic be presented and publicly discussed with thorough preparation. More thorough than the one that would require a project for a construction project, or a draft and discussion for a law. Because, we believe that the way of presenting such an important topic to our children is an extremely sensitive matter. And yet, we believe that religious education is necessary. Both for the Church and for state education.
The church mission is going quite well even in the current circumstances of freedom, which the Church fought for during 2019/20, opposing the bizarre law passed by the Parliament of Montenegro at the end of 2019. In the current circumstances, in the state of Montenegro, the Church has guaranteed and obvious freedom to carry out its mission and preach the word of God to all ages. The churches are full, and the construction of new ones is planned. This allows the Church, despite some still unresolved property and legal problems with the state, to conduct religious education for children and adults at all churches and monasteries. In addition, the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro has the secondary theological school of St. Peter of Cetinje in Cetinje, and the Orthodox Gymnasium of St. Sava in Podgorica. The introduction of religious education in secular schools would be - in my personal opinion - a new quality in terms of expanding the church mission but also improving state education.
However, if there is no reason for haste and recklessness, we need the first step in the direction of this topic, and it could be a polemic with those attitudes that perceive "religious education in schools" as a social danger, and who emphasize this danger as if they were talking about the spread of narcotics or peer violence in school classrooms. Is religious education possible and necessary in the schools of democratic societies of the 21st century? Only if we answer that question positively, we can and should solve questions of form, doubts about teachers and pedagogical goals. Because those other, derivative questions are certainly on the mind of every conscientious mathematician, historian or English language teacher. And this fundamental question, whether there can be religious education at all today, must be answered from the level of some principles, and not from the level of ideological hatred towards religion. That is, even if someone is motivated by such hatred to engage in this debate, he must put it aside and justify his “fear of religion” and animosity towards “priests” with some reasonable arguments. Are these reasons from the domain of concern for a secular society? Or do they come from a concern for the scientific character of the educational system? Or are the arguments against religious education based on the comparative experiences of countries that are civil, democratic and secular and have, for this reason, perhaps removed religious education from their school systems?
First. The secular character of public schools cannot be violated by the appearance of some religious content in the programs, just as, for example, the secularity of America is not violated by the frequent mention of God's name, or by the performance of priestly rites in key official, state occasions, and certainly - in schools there. It can only be violated by the appearance of churches and religious communities passing laws on education, appointing school administrations and boards, or (even when it comes to religious education) nominating themselves, without going through the procedure, and bringing lecturers and textbooks into classrooms, without the approval of state authorities. However, no one seeks such a situation, because it would be equally harmful to both the church and the state. Unlike the vision that the ruling DPS had until yesterday - that the civic party creates or restores the church, or the Marxist one that "religion is the opium of the people", the church and the state should be separate in organization and functioning, but no principle of secularism prohibits them from cooperating, where there is a general public interest in it. As is the case, for example, in the examples of the so-called cooperative separation in Austria, Italy, Spain, Germany and other Western democracies that have both guaranteed (possible) and confessional religious education (or its non-confessional alternative). And let's not talk about the regulations of Croatia, a country that is being imposed on us (however we understand this imposition) as a model on our European path. It is interesting to note that in Germany, when it comes to religious education, the rules are somewhat more rigid in non-confessional schools on the territory of the former DR (East, communist) Germany, which confirms my position that religious education in secular schools and universities is an original achievement of the Western European tradition, which is opposed by the consciousness formed in communist anti-theism.
"Cooperation is today a key concept in relations between church and state in EU countries, and after the fall of the communist regime in the whole of Europe," says Silvio Ferrari, a professor at the Faculty of Law in Milan, one of the leading experts on this subject. Even the most secular EU country, France, has allowed in its regulations: the possibility of a priest in school; an additional day off (except Sunday) that would give an absent student the opportunity to attend religious instruction; the maintenance of compulsory religious instruction in Alsace and Lorraine (the eastern regions on the border with Germany).
Second. Does the introduction of religious education disrupt the scientific environment (in terms of methods, goals, etc.) in modern schools? Is faith in God something that is the opposite of science? If this "science" is not dialectical materialism, which we have had in our schools for decades as a school subject, Marxism, then there is no basis for such a negative, non-scientific understanding of religion. Because, you won't believe it, one of the current definitions of scientific knowledge is: justified true belief. So, science (the natural, experimental one) is also based on human belief. Primarily in what is visible, measurable and tangible. But is our school system based on only such, experimental, empirical type of science? What about the methodology of social (“spiritual” as many Western European philosophers and philologists call them) sciences? To what extent is it measurable and subject to laboratory calculations? And yet it is represented in our schools, although completely different from the methodology of natural and mathematical sciences. What about the most diverse theories of art?
On the other hand, the term “theology” was not coined by some priest, but by one of the founders of rationalistic thinking and what we call European science – Plato (“The Republic”, book two). Furthermore, the four basic requirements for the consistency of scientific methodology (defined by Heinrich Scholz back in 1930), namely: non-contradiction among axioms, correct deduction, accuracy and comprehensibility – apply equally to secular science and to theology. The fact that someone prefers to deal with axioms starting from the never and in any way provable “primordial soup” of Aleksandr Oparin, and his abiogenesis of life from non-life, through imaginary chemical events, is no less a matter of taste and feeling than a worldview that will, through the same axioms, lead us to the assumption of a Creator in the Supervisor of the cosmos. Njegos, Plato and Aristotle are separated by centuries and different understandings of many things, but they are connected precisely by "theology" which, from atoms to galaxies, sees everywhere the "First Mover" or the "Supreme Good" or the glorious "Mind Force". Someone will say that this is a rational or poetic representation of God, which is not the same as the confessional one, but that would be a superficial proletarian view of the confessional world, which does not come out of the church gate or a tightly buttoned mantle. This is exactly why we need religious education, to explain to children how the song "Crnogorac k svemogucem Bogu" puts Njegoš closer to the author of the biblical psalms than to any philosopher or secular poet. When I was in elementary and high school, we were taught "Draška iz Vletaka" and Vuk Mandušić's "Love Dream", and some others, but the aforementioned "Ode to God", a poem that ingeniously connects man with the Creator, and that is based on empirical observation of the world around him, was unknown to us. And it was not invented by priests, but rather hidden from us by Marxists.
Many criticisms of religious education in schools are based on a dogmatic belief in the omnipotence of science, which on that basis renders all non-scientific activities of the mind superfluous in the field of education. However, such a belief in science is not scientific. Nobel laureate and Oxford immunologist Peter Madevar wrote the work "Frontiers of Science" and there he stated that the aforementioned scientific boundaries are determined by the existence of questions that science will never be able to answer, regardless of its progress: How did everything come about? Why are we here? What is the purpose of life? And I will immodestly follow up on this Nobel laureate with the question: why should we hide this transcendent side of the curiosity of our intelligence from the youngest? Why shouldn't we offer them (at least through two classes a week, in an elective subject) a glimpse into the spirituality that has been dealing with these questions for thousands of years, and which, by the way, created 90% of the cultural monuments in their country?
He believes in the beneficial mutual overlap between religion and science, for example Francis Collins, evolutionary biologist (leader of the Human Genome Project) who explicitly states that "the principles of faith are compatible with the principles of science." He published a work "The language of God" in which he claims that "the wonder and orderliness of nature points to God the Creator." Owen Greenrich, a Harvard astronomer, has published the book "God's Universe" in which he says that "the universe is created with intention and purpose, which is a faith that does not disrupt the scientific enterprise”… Not to mention. All of them are top scientists, who are following in the footsteps of Tesla, Pupin, Njegoš, Newton, Pascal, Copernicus' freethinking, which is curious, investigative, sometimes in some of them even in conflict with the official position of the church in their time, but never against faith in God, nor against the confession to which they belong.
The modern era of human history is based on the knowledge that there is no objective world (at least not in the domain of spirit, culture, art), outside our power of understanding, beyond the art of interpretation and the language with which we will express it. Every break with the previous tradition, or its reevaluation, created a new culture. In the history of humanity, there are three such reevaluations based on a new interpretation of the old: the post-Aristotelian reflection on ancient Greek myth; the New Testament interpretation of the Old Testament and the Protestant interpretation of the entire Bible. The latter is seen by many as the beginning of modern philosophical and philological hermeneutics. In any case, the interpretation of the Holy Scriptures is the activity of the human spirit (especially the European one) that founded the modern humanistic sciences and trends in European art. Some will call these sciences social (a name domesticated in the local communist-atheist system), while in Western Europe they will be called: spiritual sciences (activity, reflection, experience of truth by the human spirit). (Diltas) When it comes to the course of European art, not only medieval art, but also Renaissance, humanistic, romantic, realist, and all sorts of other art forms... whether it's music, literature, or fine arts, it is unthinkable without interpretations not only of the biblical text (as an impressive literary work) but also of church ritual and cult.
Martin Heidegger was impressed by Augustine's connection "between what is to be understood and the attitude/way of life of the one who understands" by which he recognized Augustine as a proto-existentialist. On the other hand, Gadamer took over from Augustine the dialogical understanding of language, according to which every possible statement can be interpreted as an answer to a previously posed question (whether that from the outside of the interlocutor, or that from the inside of the soul). And yet, what the aforementioned 20th-century thinkers would notice as insightful and useful in Augustine's philosophy grew out of Augustine's attempt to interpret language at the same time as the super-rational mystery of the Holy Trinity (Father-Word/Son-Spirit).
In the 16th century, Luther and Melanchthon were searching for a scientific method of interpreting the text of the Bible, and as such, they were the founders of hermeneutics, a kind of skill in understanding the context of what was written (Scripture, if we read it expertly, is self-explanatory). The Protestant rules of rhetoric concern not only the “skill of (one’s) expression” but also the “prudent understanding of other/other people’s texts”. Seen in this way, the Bible is not just one in a series of literary works and a monument of ancient-Jewish literature, but also a text that – with its call to be always reinterpreted – inspired all subsequent cultural epochs of humanity. However, the word “hermeneutics” was only coined in the following, 17th century, by Johann Konrad Danhauer, a Strasbourg (I draw your attention to the word that follows again:) theologian. He initiated a thoughtful search for a new method of science, free from scholasticism. In the vestibule of all sciences, he said, we need a general science of interpretation. Previously, this introductory position (prerequisite of all sciences) belonged to logic. However, logic seeks the factuality/truthfulness of a statement, while hermeneutics seeks its meaning regardless of exactness/factuality. In other words, before the factuality of a statement can be established, it is necessary to know the meaning (what was really meant to be said). Later, Schleiermacher (19th century) would note that the basis of hermeneutics = the scientific search for truth is nothing other than the search for understanding (dialogue). According to the understanding of these luminaries of spiritual sciences, understanding a text (primarily the Bible) or understanding another who is addressing us is the starting point of science. Later, human scientific thought distinguished the methods of natural sciences to determine the legality of what is observed, and history (of spiritual sciences) to understands what is being said.
It is obvious that the phenomenon of science is much more complex than the contempt for the church and priests, and their expulsion from the public sphere and education.
Already mentioned philosopher Hans Georg Gadamer in his work "Truth and Method" discusses the status of art, history and other spiritual activities in the human cognitive process, and emphasizes their legitimacy and equality with the natural sciences in the search for truth. They share a common aspiration to understand the truth, but the ways and methods are incomparable. Criticizing Kant's radical subjectivization of aesthetic consciousness (according to which there is no place for the concept of truth in aesthetics), Gadamer believes that in the experience of art we have a "demand for truth" that is different from the demands set by natural science, but in no way lags behind it. Artistic cognition of truth is different from any mental, conceptual cognition, but nevertheless remains a cognition or experience/experience of truth. In this sense, Gadamer talks about the phenomenon of play, about the presentation of an image, about writing and reading a letter... He speaks about the activity/undertaking of understanding the text (the context and reasons that led the writer to express himself in a certain way), which we do not need when reading Euclid's mathematical postulates, written long ago, but it is when reading, for example, a biblical text.
Characteristic of Gadamer's understanding of science is the attitude towards tradition and authority, in connection with which he criticizes the Enlightenment era for its negative attitude towards the prejudices of the subject, towards our preconceptions. Namely, Gadamer sees the Enlightenment criticism of prejudice as the greatest prejudice (because they saw prejudice as a consequence of either haste or "slavery to someone else's authority") and says that it is impossible for our guaranteed finality not to be without prejudice. And this is because we always, inevitably belong to some tradition, some language. Therefore, respect for authority does not have to be an expression of "blind obedience", but can equally be a choice of our mind and free will. Our maturity (graduation) and coming out of the shadow of the educator (from the necessity of his assistance), never makes us completely free from origin and tradition. Tradition exists and survives, among other things, because it is intelligently understood and accepted by subsequent generations. Preserving tradition and the opinions of authorities is no less an act of free will than is a reversal, novelty or break with tradition. It is precisely in the spiritual sciences that understanding is conditioned by tradition (choice of topics, formulation of questions, interest in something...). And although the natural sciences also imply the influence of certain prior knowledge, in them the success and truthfulness of a scientific undertaking is measured exclusively by the result that is "now" before us (whether "now" something can be measured, built, translated... based on some calculation, formula). So an old ancient bridge may still be in some function (but nowhere near to the extent and in the way it was when it was built), and it will most likely need some reconstruction in order to maintain its accuracy (sustainability, truthfulness of the bridge...). However, its possible beauty is timeless, and paradoxically - too much "presentness" (technical reconstruction) could endanger the classicism (timelessness, truthfulness) of its aesthetics.
Spiritual sciences (philology, history, law) are based on the undertaking/event of understanding. The subjective application of what is observed/read in them is an integral/inseparable part of understanding. There is no one without the other. The text of a law by a judge who judges; unwritten notes by a pianist; rules of painting in relation to how someone will paint; reading the Bible by a priest… all these cases require constant application, as a simultaneous act of understanding. While the natural-scientific experiment sees the measure of success in the reduction of the subjective and pre-convinced (endless repetition, imitation of nature in laboratory conditions) in order to arrive at the objective… That is why art theorists speak of the “radiance” of the beautiful and clear from what is true. This is in accordance with Augustine’s observation that the first appearance of the word of God (the biblical moment) is related to light. Light as a prerequisite for every future shaping, discernment…. The artistically, morally and spiritually "beautiful" is the opposite of the useful (usable, measurable) and ugly (not to be looked at), and is related to "good". Beauty has the ability to shine (brings itself into being and - as if speaking only to us). Similar to the beauty experienced in this way, the "clarity of the understandable" also shines. So "beautiful and clear" are the events of radiance, which happen to our limited existence. Meaning = the truth of a text wins us/draws us into the game in the same way and with the same force as we are attracted by the radiance of some beauty.
The natural-scientific world abstracts every experience into an “object of consideration”, thereby negating or neutralizing the interactive reality of life. And while this “objectifying” observation of the world “knows no boundaries” (which will obviously bring us “to the very edge” of ecological catastrophe or atomic war), the experience of language, tradition, interaction rests precisely on the awareness of boundaries, of finitude. The natural-scientific, methodological view of the world is legitimate and fruitful, but it is neither the only nor the most comprehensive experience of truth that we possess. The language of natural sciences is unambiguous, eliminates the subject, excessively objectifies every topic, their procedure is “cleansed” of chance and unpredictability. Hence, the feeling of man’s alienation from the world is precisely what strengthens in the epoch of science…
Finally, although the model of a multidisciplinary intellectual institution is Plato's pagan academy, the history of most (currently existing and active) universities in Western Europe begins with the medieval, Christian tradition of dealing with rational science and its refinement and advancement. Among them are certainly the most famous universities: the one already mentioned in Oxford, but also the European educational centers in Cambridge, Leipzig, Tübingen, Glasgow, Bologna, Rome, Athens... Their composition and program include, among other things, even today - you won't believe it - theology studies.
From all this "first" and "second" comes the third. And it reads: the Western European scientific and Christian tradition has never sought to sever the ties between religion and science. And this is equally evident in concrete examples of legal solutions regarding education, and the survival of theological studies in the most prestigious European universities, as well as in the aforementioned examples of the development of scientific thought (especially in the social/spiritual sciences) that have survived throughout the modern century to this day.
Most of the objections here regarding the proposal to introduce religious education concern the inherited Bolshevik attitude towards Orthodoxy, which in quasi-civic packaging sounds like this: Protestants are free-thinking and polite, Roman Catholics have reformed, and the Serbian Orthodox Church produces and supports war crimes and teaches that the Earth is a “flat plate”. If there were no other reasons, this narrative would be enough reason for priests (along with imams and pastors) to enter classrooms and present their faith (the faith of most students and their parents) for what it is: non-violent, God-seeking, tolerant of dissenters, motivating to good and humane deeds, benevolent towards science, powerful to answer questions for which science does not and cannot have answers.
Now, if someone is not in a good mood, they might notice how the above-mentioned history of European universities, imbued with theology and piety towards the otherworld, developed parallel and simultaneously with the emergence of the Inquisition, the Crusades, colonial conquests and oppression of the countries of the New World – both by the Roman Catholic empires and by the advanced world of the Reformation, from London to Washington. So how do you explain to someone that all that human blood shed, in the name of various churches, from the Middle Ages to the present day, mostly has nothing to do with Blessed Augustine, nor with the administration and teaching staff of the aforementioned universities, nor with Gadamer's return to authority and tradition, but has to do with the greed of semi-literate powerful people? Well, if they don't want to hear you, it's hard. And even more difficult than that would be to measure on some bar of common sense how many crimes against people were committed by those in power who referred to the Bible or the Koran, and how many and how many were committed by those who declared themselves as opponents of the holy books? On this other side are Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot ("Khmer Rouge"), Robespierre... so whoever has the time and nerve should settle the accounts.
There is certainly a danger from unprofessional and ill-intentioned religious education teachers. But is it any less dangerous than the same teachers of physics or mathematics? The former can really sell you hatred or some kind of superstition under the title of "faith", and the latter can recruit future architects whose bridges and canopies will collapse on people's heads. So should mathematics be thrown out of schools because of this?
Bonus video:
