Other fields like confirmation work but also Christian children and youth work, Sunday School, adult education, etc., have received much less attention. At the same time, as will be shown in the following, it is this understanding which makes confirmation work an interesting topic for research.įinally, it is probably fair to say that research concerning questions of education in practical theology and religious education (which sometimes is considered a sub-discipline of practical theology and sometimes a discipline of its own) has mainly been directed at the school subject Religious Education. That the respective programmes can be viewed as non-formal education, however, is a new development which deserves special consideration. In contrast to traditional forms of catechesis, the modern concept of confirmation work now in use refers to ways of working with young people, which are closer to general youth work than to traditional school teaching.įor Protestants it has always been clear that confirmation work has to do with getting to know - and to understand - the Christian faith. Following the terminology of earlier times, preparation for confirmation can also be called catechesis, which was often based on rote learning. In many Protestant churches, confirmation is celebrated around the age of 14 years, after a period of so-called confirmation time of one or two years. This institutional reference is what distinguishes non-formal from informal settings or situations, which explains why this concept may be especially suitable in the context of Christian congregations.Ĭonfirmation work is also a comparatively new concept which refers to what in earlier times, in the Protestant tradition until the 1960s and 1970s, was called confirmation instruction or preparation for confirmation.
While the understanding of this concept will be laid out in more detail in the following, it should be clear from the beginning that it refers to non-compulsory non-school-type settings which, however, still imply some kind of institution or institutional framework as their basis. In others words, I want to use the present article as an opportunity for discussing some of these implications more thoroughly and to advance our understanding of the needs and possibilities of research in religious education and practical theology.įor this purpose, I suggest to consider confirmation work as an example of what has come to be called non-formal education. However, the study has a number of general implications for research in religious education and in practical theology which have not yet been described and discussed in any detailed manner. 2015 2017) and there is no need to repeat what can be found in these volumes. Schweitzer, Ilg & Simojoki 2010 Schweitzer et al. The results are accessible in a number of books in several languages (in English cf. At this point, most parts of the study have been completed. The study includes Germany where I myself live and work, as well as eight other countries or churches that are part of the study (Austria, Denmark, Finland, Hungary, Norway, Poland, Sweden and Switzerland). Finally, the author considers implications of this research for religious education and practical theology in general.įor more than 10 years, one of my main research tasks has been directed at confirmation work in Europe. The experiences from this project are then discussed from the perspective of research on non-formal religious education. The author gives an overview on a more than 10-year-long project on confirmation work in nine European countries, with an emphasis on the research design, methods, and main results. By describing the growing awareness of the theological and educational meaning and importance of non-formal education and by reviewing the literature on research in religious education which appears to be focused somewhat one-sidedly on the formal context of the school and of the school subject of Religious Education, the author creates a background for the presentation of current research on confirmation work in Europe. This article discusses the need for researching non-formal religious education as a neglected field of empirical research in religious education. IIDepartment of Practical Theology, Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria, South Africa IDepartment of Practical Theology/Religious Education, Faculty of Protestant Theology, University of Tübingen, Germany Researching non-formal religious education: The example of the European study on confirmation work