Madam, - For an academic it is always heartening to receive a response to one's work. So I welcome Yolaine Maillet's letter of November 12th on my piece about President Sarkozy's attitude to the teaching of religion in school (Rite and Reason, November 6th). Her account of her schooling in France is interesting, but I must question her indictment of my arguments.
Firstly, I would invite her to reconsider the tone of President Sarkozy's intervention on the subject of religion in schools and the aims that he attributes to the study of the area. What the president describes is very extensive and quite akin to religious studies as taught in other jurisdictions. His remarks imply the need for a serious and focused attention to be given to the topic. This attention is unlikely to be possible in the cross-curricular treatment of religious themes that is currently mandatory. Without a sustained study of religion it is hard to envisage how the quality of understanding advocated by President Sarkozy will be achieved.
Secondly, she asks about my source for the description of the teacher of philosophy with the dismissive attitude to debating the existence of God. This is to be found in Blandine Dahéron's book Les Religions au Collège et au Lycée: qu'apprennent nos enfants? (Paris: Bayard, 2004, pp. 88-89).
Finally, a full rebuttal of her charge that I do not seem to have understood the concept of laïcité would take more space than the Editor of this newspaper would allow, though I would be happy to refer her to some scholarly articles of mine on the subject. - Yours, etc,
KEVIN WILLIAMS, Mater Dei Institute, Dublin 3.