Serbian Education Minister Ljiljana Colic has ordered schools to stop teaching children the theory of evolution for this year, and to resume teaching it in future only if it shares equal billing with creationism.
The move has shocked educators and textbook editors in the formerly communist state, where religion was kept out of education and politics and was only recently allowed to enter the classroom.
“(Darwinism) is a theory as dogmatic as the one which says God created the first man,” Colic told the daily Glas Javnosti.
Colic, an Orthdox Christian, ordered that evolution theory be dropped from this year’s biology course for 14- and 15-year-olds in the final grade of primary school. As of next year, both creationism and evolution will be taught, she said.
Darwinism and dogma
Creationism teaches that a supernatural being created man and the universe. Most scientists regard “creation science” as religious dogma, not empirical science.
“Both theories exist in parallel and legitimately in the rest of the world,” Colic asserted. “The evolutionist, which says man is descended from the ape, and the one which says God Almighty created man and the entire world.”
Courts in the United States have quashed repeated attempts by Christian fundamentalists to have the teaching of evolution banned from schools or countered by lessons in creationism.
Kansas scrubbed all mention of evolution and Big Bang theory from its curriculum in 1999, but does not ban their teaching.
‘Theocratic state’?
Belgrade University biology lecturer Nikola Tucic called the education minister’s ruling a “disaster.”
“This is outrageous ... We are slowly turning into a theocratic state and in the 21st century we are going back to the Book of Revelations,” Tucic told Glas Javnosti, referring to the final section of the Christian Bible.
“Where did the minister get the idea that Darwin’s theory was dogmatic? There were attempts like this in several U.S. states, but they were rejected. It turns out that our fundamentalists are much more successful,” he said.
Colic said it was “normal that a minister’s personality leaves a mark,” adding: “This is my mark, and time will tell if I was right.”
There would be no censorship of existing textbooks, she said. “That particular lesson (evolution) will stay in the textbook, but will not be taught. At the same time, pupils can choose whether they’ll take religious classes or not.”
Religion was not taught in the school system of communist Yugoslavia. It was introduced to Serbian classrooms after socialist strongman Slobodan Milosevic was toppled in 2000.
Lecturer Tucic suspected Colic’s order was a move by Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica to bolster his conservative party’s flagging political strength by winning church support.
“This was a political decision which clearly shows the church is not minding its own business, but is deep into politics,” he said.
