RELIGIOUS EDUCATION AND SECULARITY: implications for the implementation of democracy in schools

This article defends secularism within the Brazilian public schools, makes a brief history of Religious Education and demonstrates how this discipline has been developing in the official schools. This paper emphasizes that kind of teaching has always been present in the Brazilian school reality, not only as effective presence, but also as a way of thinking about the world, thus hampering the design of the first Republicans to build a secular school in Brazil. It concludes by recognizing that in the current context secularism in schools is fundamental condition to the effectiveness of emancipatory education that enables the implementation of democracy in schools.