Religious Youth in a Secular Culture

Abstract

In this chapter I am commenting on Dan Paul Jozsa’s article on Islam in Education partly by referring to the overall REDCo project (of which I myself was also a participant) and partly by discussing some of the issues in a Nordic perspective. It is mentioned that young people may have quite different understanding of what it means to ‘have a religion’ and that in the age of 14–16, membership and belonging may sometimes be confused. Also the majority/minority dimension is highlighted as an important issue when considering results from the quantitative study. Regarding Norwegian students it is pointed out that religion is largely considered to be a marginal phenomenon in young people’s lives, but that Muslims in general and the small groups of active Christians seem to differ. It is suggested that possibly young active Christians may feel even more marginalized than young Muslims in the secularized Nordic countries. It is also mentioned a tendency in Norwegian religious education that the personal dimensions of religion is underplayed in school and that pupils may lose something if this is not improved.