A lead editorial in The Sunday Telegraph summed up the sad state of Christian education in the United Kingdom today.
A lead editorial in The Sunday Telegraph summed up the sad state of Christian education in the United Kingdom today, betraying a rich historic legacy:
"The Christian religion is the foundation of most of Britain's culture and traditions. The history of our nation is incomprehensible without some knowledge of it. And yet . . . the rudiments of Christianity are frequently poorly taught—if, indeed, they are taught at all. A report by Ofsted [the education watchdog] has found that, although nominally required by the national curriculum, in many schools instruction is 'superficial,' and is treated less seriously than the study of other religions" ("the Foundation of Our Culture," June 6, 2010, emphasis added throughout). This is particularly true in secondary schools.
In the same issue of The Sunday Telegraph, education correspondent Julie Henry wrote in a separate feature article, "In non-faith state schools, Christian assemblies are being dropped in favour of multi-faith worship, despite a legal requirement for Christian collective worship, and children are no longer taught the Lord's Prayer" ("Schools Failing to Teach Children the Core Beliefs of Christianity, Says Ofsted" June 6, 2010). She rightly advises that "getting to grips with the key teachings of Jesus Christ and other core elements of Christianity are building blocks that will help our young people analyse and interpret the society they are growing up in."
The lead editorial previously quoted also said: "There is, as Ofsted euphemistically puts it, 'uncertainty' about what the teachings of Christianity should involve." This is the crux of the problem. Even traditional Christianity has missed out on truly understanding the basic teachings of Christ given in the four Gospel accounts and fleshed out in the rest of the New Testament, all solidly based on the fundamentals of the Old Testament (see 2 Timothy 3:15-17; 2 Peter 1:20-21).
The largely unrecognized apostasy from the true faith is explained in our free booklet The Church Jesus Built, which you can request or download from our Web site. (Source: The Telegraph [London].)
