I AM writing to you regarding the RE Core Syllabus for Northern Ireland schools. This syllabus is a matter of great concern to me and many others who are anxious to see a genuine process of peace and reconciliation in the province. I know that, as Minister for Political Development, you are deeply involved in talks designed to establish new political structures which would receive the allegiance of both communities. Important though this aspect is, such structures by themselves will not solve the Northern Ireland Problem.

The reason is that the conflict is not purely political. If it was, the Problem would have been solved long ago. Religion is a crucial element and provides the cement in the walls of division. Some writers, like Hickey in Religion and the Northern Ireland Problem, Conor Cruise O'Brien in Ancestral Voices and Bruce in God Save Ulster and The Edge of the Union even go so far as to suggest that it is essentially a religious quarrel. We do not have to agree wholeheartedly with this view to acknowledge the important role that religion plays in creating and sustaining our social apartheid. Clearly, this role must be addressed if real progress is to be achieved.

In essence, it is vital that the young, whose task it will be to make the future better than the past, are provided with an understanding of the nature of the religious division and With a means of avoiding the mistakes of former generations. Yet the new Core Syllabus in RE offers little hope that these aims will be realised.

Nowhere does this document explain to Protestant or Catholic children the nature of the difference between them in historical or theological terms. In short, there is nothing in this syllabus to counter the widespread assumption on the one side that the Pope is the anti-Christ or on the other that Protestants are not 'real' Christians. In the face of 25 years of sectarian strife and centuries of bigotry on both sides, this omission is a shocking dereliction of duty.

Not only does the syllabus fail in any way to counter religious prejudice; it also fails to take account of modern scholarship. Instead, it adopts a narrow, literalist conception of Christianity, implicitly rejecting evolution, endorsing Adam and Eve and reinforcing paternalism. As such, it merely serves to perpetuate a frightening certitude about what constitutes true belief. In a society where there are two sets of dogmatisms, this is hardly a recipe for the creation of mutual understanding and tolerance.

But perhaps the most reprehensible feature of all is that it is exclusively Christian. As such, it implicitly rejects the pluralism of the wider society. The people of Northern Ireland are not exclusively Christian. There are Jews, Moslems, Sikhs and members of other religious faiths, as wall as about 12 % of the population who have no religion. In any case, all children have a basic right to learn about the major life stances adopted by the peoples of this world.

Humanism is a life stance which is growing throughout Europe and here in Northern Ireland. Many RE syllabuses in Great Britain now acknowledge not only the existence of other religions besides Christianity but also include humanism. The syllabus for the London borough of Hounslow, for example, is called Widening Horizons and includes humanism as a core area.

In marked contrast we in Ulster have an RE syllabus which seeks not to open children's minds but instead strives to keep them firmly closed. The child is being denied its basic rights and an opportunity to make his or her own choices from among the alternative life stances. Instead of encouraging children to think for themselves and examine their own traditions critically, the Northern Ireland RE Core Syllabus is a perfect example of the primitive concept of education in which each tribe seeks to pass on to the next generation its own rituals and prejudices. It thus negates the whole peace process.

It is no use saying that children have a right to opt out of Assembly and RE lessons. There are cases where this legal right has been denied to parents by school principals in this province and at present the parents are powerless to do anything about it, apart from the drastic step of withdrawing their child from the schools concerned.

As a humanist, I would like to see RE abolished altogether and replaced by Moral Education or Education in Stances for Living. However, I realise that this is unlikely to happen in the near future. A more immediately practical change would be to replace the 'opting out' procedure by 'opting in' in the same way that your government has approached the political fund in trade unions. At the very least, this RE Syllabus should be scrapped and rewritten with inputs from other religious groups and from humanists.