Contemporary religious education and religious studies syllabuses, including local education authority-agreed syllabuses and the increasingly popular GCSE examination courses, enable RE teachers to provide young people with opportunities for moral and spiritual development.

They take the perspectives of living religions (and other belief systems) seriously, something that Maurice Plaskow doesn’t seem to do.

His sole reliance on rationality as a basis for ethics looks reductionist to me.

It is desirable that the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority’s work in this area should build on current good practice in religious education and other areas of the curriculum, making space for the insight and contribution of the various moral communities that share in the national community’s concern for the values we share with the rising generation.

LAT BLAYLOCK Executive officer Professional Council for Religious Education Derby