Catechetics|Religious Education and Didactics
Designing | accompanying | researchingreligious education processes
The practice and theory of religious education processes are at the centre of what we do in the Catechetics|Religious Education and Didactics of Religion department. We conceptualise and reflect on ways to challenge and accompany people to position themselves in the field of worldview and religion and to deepen their knowledge. In doing so, we understand our actions within the horizon of freedom; we want to contribute to a broadening of horizons.
We develop didactic options and models for religious education in various places, each of which is characterised by its own specific laws, e.g. family, kindergarten, parish, adult education. We are particularly attentive to the religious dimension in the heterogeneous field of schools, religious education in the context of religious education and the training of religious education teachers.
As an open and curious part of a pluralistic society, we operate from the tradition of Christian faith with a Catholic character. We engage in interdisciplinary cooperation with other theological disciplines and religions, with educational, human and social sciences as well as other specialised didactics. We maintain close cooperation with the Muslim colleagues of the Department of Islamic Theology and Religious Education at the Faculty of Teacher Education at the University of Innsbruck - with the aim of further developing interreligious teaching, learning and reflection processes.
Furthermore, we analyse all educational processes and contexts from a theological perspective. This means taking a critical look at these processes - paying attention to who is involved and how, and to what extent a transcendental dimension is able to broaden the view. In this context, science and university didactics are of particular importance.
An essential theoretical foundation of our work is Ruth C. Cohn's theme-centred interaction and communicative theology. The lives and experiences of individuals and groups today are brought into a lively dialogue with the 'congealed experience' of religious traditions and concrete social circumstances.