RELIGION IN EDUCATION IN SOUTHEAST ASIA: VALUES, IDENTITY, AND COEXISTENCE CAPACITY IN MULTI-RELIGIOUS CONTEXTS

Abstract

This article examines religion in education at the intersection of education studies, cultural studies, the sociology of religion, and public governance in Southeast Asia. Instead of treating religion as a fixed curricular object, the article asks what forms of knowledge, rights awareness, digital media literacy, and coexistence capacity learners need in societies shaped by multiple religions and worldviews. Methodologically, the study combines a conceptual review with qualitative content analysis of a purposively selected documentary corpus, including scholarly literature, international guidance documents, legal-policy materials, regional reports, and selected official sources relating to the 11 current ASEAN member states, including Timor-Leste after its admission to ASEAN in October 2025. The analysis uses both deductive and inductive coding to identify thematic clusters and construct a country-level comparative matrix. The findings distinguish faith-transmission religious education from education about religion as an academic, non-coercive, and rights-respecting practice. They show that religion enters education through three interrelated dimensions: value formation, identity construction, and coexistence capacity. The regional comparison further indicates that Southeast Asian systems cannot be reduced to one model. Officially Islamic or Muslim-majority contexts, Theravada Buddhist contexts, Catholic-influenced contexts, and multi-religious or citizenship-governed contexts each raise different questions of fairness, representation, school governance, and policy implementation. The article proposes a coexistence-capacity framework with five interrelated elements: academic study of religion; recognition of lived faith without coercion; protection of freedom of religion or belief, including the right not to believe and minority rights; digital media literacy; and intercultural dialogue as a route toward responsible coexistence. Its contribution lies in shifting curriculum design from the question of which religion should be taught to the question of how education can prepare learners to interpret religious difference responsibly, resist prejudice, evaluate digital religious discourse, and participate ethically in shared civic life.