We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.

José Ortega Y Gasset, The Revolt of the Masses, 1930

It is not easy to teach impartially about certain subject matter. Public school teachers face a particularly challenging task. They have a constitutional imperative to teach in a neutral manner about the religion domain and about the role of religion in history.

Religion has been a decisive factor in the development of civilizations. So too, though, has free and independent thinking. If religion is deserving of academic attention, then so are the rational imperatives and habits of open inquiry that compel some individuals in every era to turn aside from conventional religious explanations and interpret in their own ways the world in which they live.

Some of the dramatic moments in history occurred when independent reasoning or critical thinking confronted traditional authority or an existing religious institution. These events involved either an independent thinker challenging religious authority from within religion, or a freethinker challenging religion from a position of nonbelief. It is important for social science teachers to give students the intellectual tools for comprehending and analyzing such episodes.

Religion as a strand of subject matter considered without its nonconforming counterpart yields a biased curriculum. This site provides instructional materials and resource information to help classroom teachers guide future generations of citizens to an understanding of the contributions to history of autonomous thinking. It will facilitate their ongoing task of providing students with an accurate and objective perspective on human history.

John B. Massen, Founder of OABITAR
(Objectivity, Accuracy, and Balance In Teaching About Religion)
San Mateo, California