Most of the rest of the Western World has basic religious education starting in grade school. My Irish friend was wondering at how Americans had no grasp on European history. He remarked, “Of course they would have to learn such basic differences as Protestantism and Catholicism.” Americans are so religiously uneducated as to be stupefied by something every European teenager knows. That has pretty far-reaching implications for the understanding of history and other humanities. We are disastrously uneducated about world religions that impact global events. Perhaps worse we are ignorant even of our country’s Christian diversity and makeup. We are this way principally out of fear of Christian fundamentalist backlash.
In the American school system, we have largely dealt with the problem of Christian fundamentalism by not teaching about religion, and trying (artificially, I might add) to strip religious issues from every other humanity. This is both educationally disingenuous and crippling. In a lot of cases, you either end up with nothing or whatever the fundies can sneak in by hook or crook. What a recipe for ignorance, and it shows.
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