Will I Do Harm?

For the past 17 years I have been the religion teacher at Canterbury School. Canterbury School is an independent college preparatory school for preschool through 12^th grade. The school’s philosophy states, “We believe that students should develop a strong and broad base of knowledge, a genuine love for and appreciation of the challenges of learning and an understanding of the implications of Christian principles in their daily lives."  The wording of Christian principles instead of Christian faith is intentional so that students off all faiths will be comfortable attending Canterbury School. The school is fortunate to have many different faiths represented in the student body.

Before I started working at Canterbury School my husband and I decided to send our oldest son to the school. I remember so clearly visiting the school and reading about the various curricula. But the area we as parents paid the most attention to was the religion curriculum. We wanted to know what was being taught, who was teaching it, and how it was being taught. We weren’t interested in meeting the music teacher or the PE teacher but we were interested in meeting the religion teacher. And we weren’t wondering if she was going to do ‘good’ for our child, like we would have wondered about the other teachers. We wanted to know if she was going to do 'harm' to our child.  Our faith was important to us and so it was important to know what our child was learning.  We did meet the religion teacher and we decided she would not be doing any harm to our child and his faith.

The next year I became that religion teacher. Now those parents whose faith was important to them would be asking the same question that I had asked the year before. They would not be wondering what ‘good’ I would be doing for their child. Instead they would be asking me, will I do 'harm' to their child? I understood the importance of the question. That was the beginning of my interfaith journey.

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