Education

D 26 May 2021   

Programs of basic education include religious instruction or ethics course. Students are required to enrol in one of these courses. The program of the Catholic religion classes is determined by the archdiocese, which also appoints teachers. The students in secondary education have to choose either a Catholic religion course or a morals and values course. The teachers of religion as moral and social education are appointed by the Ministry of National Education. While until 2002 students could be exempted from attending these two classes, they are currently required to enrol in one of them.

The Luxembourgish Government signed an Agreement with the religious communities in January 2015, establishing a new legal framework regulating their relationship. The new system will be in force after the future constitutional reform. This process is not yet completed. With regard to the field of religious education, the new Agreement stipulates the disestablishment of the ‘two course system’, institutionalizing instead the course on ‘values’. The Ministry of Education, and not the Archbishop of Luxembourg, will be the competent authority to hire and appoint the new teachers, who will be subject to the public sector labour law.

D 26 May 2021    AKonstantinos Papastathis APhilippe Poirier