Two senior British clerics, one Catholic and one Anglican, have stated publicly that there is value in non-Christians attending Christian faith schools, but it would be bad for Christians to attend Muslim faith schools. Apparently, Christianity is regarded as a neutral, default religion that everyone can benefit from.

The Telegraph reports:

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, welcomed that fact that Jewish and Muslim parents sent their children to Catholic schools because they like the "ethos".

But he said that he would not want large numbers of Catholic children attending Muslim schools because he would not want them to be brought up "in that atmosphere". The Cardinal added that, while he welcomed dialogue between the faiths, "fundamentally the creed of Islam is totally diverse from the creed of Christianity."

But not so "totally diverse" that it's a problem for Muslim students to attend Christian schools?

Reacting to remarks by his fellow faith leaders, [Sir Iqbal Sacranie, secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain] told the programme: "I think this is the difficulty which we have - that what is good for myself and my children should also be seen to be good for others as well.

Sacranie is right — the attitude here is that Christianity is good for everyone, but other religions like Islam are not. There's even perhaps a hint of racism in this because it suggests that Muslim schools may be acceptable for some people, but not good Christian families.

Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, notes that this sort of thing is why Britain shouldn't be funding "faith schools" to begin with. Religious schooling should be turned over to local communities while the government funds and promotes just secular schooling for all children.

He has a good argument because evidence indicates that segregated schooling in Norther Ireland contributed to the violence there — Protestant children didn't socialize or go to school with Catholic children, so they grew up suspicious, distrustful, and ignorant of each other. Do British leaders want the same thing to happen between Muslims and Christians?

Read More:

• Separation of Church and State 101
• Church and State News
• Religion in Public Schools
• Secularism 101