The Implementation of Multicultural-Based Theological Education in Bengkulu City

Abstract

One of significant keys that contribute to the success of preserving the unity in cultural diversity of multiculturalism is to build respect and tolerance. This study aims at investigating the implementation of multicultural-based theological education and the barriers of its current practices at Sint Carolus Senior High School. Moreover, the possible efforts in overcoming such issues are also extensively discussed. This study is a qualitative study, a study which produces narrative description as the results of the data collected from the captured phenomenon of people and/ or their behavior both in written and oral form. This study reveals some evidences related to the implementation of multicultural theological education. First, multicultural theological education consists of several dimensions such as dimension of beliefs, dimension of religious practices, dimension of religious appreciation, dimension of religious knowledge and dimension of religious experiences. Meanwhile, the barriers to the multicultural theological education do not appear significantly since its practices do not take side only on one particular religion, yet the classroom instructions are universally made. However, the external barriers are still found such as people with lack of knowledge of multicultural theological education, habits and/or tradition, and low economic level. Therefore, such aforementioned issues can be solved by reemphasizing the multicultural theological education itself during the process of teaching and learning as well as during the process of extracurricular in school. Keywords—multicultural education; theological education