By Nikos Marantzidis and George Siakas*
The survey was conducted by PORU and it was presented in the Greek newspaper Kathimerini.
In addition to the current issues of political controversy, questions concerning the field of education have come to the forefront of politics: the issue of teaching Religious lessons and the reaction of some parents associations to the co-existence of refugee children with Greek children in the same schools.
One of the recently addressed issues, was the reaction of Archbishop Ieronimos to the statements of the Minister of Education Nikos Filis, with regard to the alternation of the way that the lesson of the Religious is being teached in the Greek schools. The Minister stated that the current confessional lesson needs to be transformed into a lesson providing general knowledge for all religions.
Which is the attitude of the Greek public opinion towards the above question? By placing this question, we observe a threefold society. 30% believe that the course should be taught as a “lesson of confessional character focusing only on Orthodox faith”. Another 34.5% say that it must be taught “as a lesson of knowledge of religions with an emphasis on Orthodoxy”, while one-in-three (30.5%) agrees that the course should be taught as “an impartial lesson providing knowledge for all religions”.
*The official article was presented in Greek and you could retreive it from here.
* Nikos Marantzidis is teaching Political Science in the University of Macedonia and George Siakas is the Research Director of Public Opinion Research Unit.
