The Victorian government accreditation body is set to approve an atheistic curriculum developed by the Humanist Society of Victoria, for teaching by volunteers during weekly religious education classes in primary schools. Christian religious education volunteers accredited by Access Ministries currently operate in about two thirds of Victorian primary schools, while other accredited instructors teach Buddhism, Judaism and Bahai.
The problem is, where do you draw the line? Jenny Stokes from the Salt Shakers is quoted as asking, “If you go there, where do you stop? What about witchcraft or Satanism? If you accredit humanism, then those things would have an equal claim to be taught in schools.” A similar problem exists with prayers at government functions. How do you decide whether a Wiccan practitioner is allowed to claim “equal time”?
Professor Desmond Cahill, who heads the body which accredits non-Christian religious education teachers, is quoted as saying: “Our view would be that humanist studies are a legitimate world view just as Catholicism, Anglicanism or Islam is, and that none are any more provable than the rest, just as theism or atheism are no more provable than the other.” Perhaps it does not matter much, because there are not going to be too many humanists who could be bothered volunteering. Besides, a humanist flannelgraph must be rather uninteresting.