These problems are difficult, of course, but they are not unsolvable. Let me summarize that position in three basic points, which I hope, will initiate further discussions. First, teaching and studying religion is a personal, as well as intellectual, enterprise. Teachers should encourage and honor their students' faith commitments. More than that, teachers need to be open with students about their own religious presuppositions.
Students have a right to know what is shaping the teacher's discourse.
And teachers have an obligation to model for students the public discussion of issues that have personal importance. Teachers can demonstrate for students how intellect and faith can work together to produce a public discussion of religion. Second, religion classes should privilege Western religious history. The Bible is the fundamental document in Western history, and little of that history can be understood outside of the trajectory of the religions that were born from it. Certainly, students need to know about world religions.