Texas has done it again. In a move that has sent shockwaves through the corridors of educational policy, the Lone Star State has mandated the teaching of Bible stories in public schools. This, while the UK—the very cradle of the Enlightenment—pushes for a secular curriculum that would make Voltaire blush. The contrast could not be starker, nor the stakes higher.
Let us first dispense with the usual platitudes. 'The Bible is a cornerstone of Western civilisation,' the defenders will cry. 'It is literature, history, morality.' To which I reply: yes, and so is the Qur'an, the Bhagavad Gita, and the sayings of Confucius. But you will not see those on the syllabus, will you? This is not about cultural literacy. This is about cultural dominance. Texas is not teaching the Bible as a historical artefact; it is teaching it as truth. And that, my dear readers, is a dangerous game.
Consider the timing. Across the Atlantic, the UK is waging its own quiet war against religious indoctrination. The campaign for secular education—led by humanist groups and backed by a government weary of faith schools—seeks to strip dogma from the classroom. Science, reason, critical thinking: these are the new commandments. And yet, in Texas, they are doubling down on Genesis. It is as if two civilisations are diverging in real time: one hurtling toward the 18th century, the other toward the 12th.
One cannot help but draw parallels with the fall of Rome. As Gibbon noted, the Empire declined when it substituted myth for reason. The Christianisation of the later Empire, for all its moral fervour, did not save it from the barbarians. It simply gave the barbarians a new set of gods. Today, Texas risks a similar fate: a state so besotted with its own righteousness that it forgets the very tools that built its prosperity. The Bible may comfort the afflicted, but it does not build microchips.
And what of the children? The young minds now fed a diet of parables and miracles, told that a man lived in a fish and an ark held every species? They will emerge not as critical thinkers but as catechists. They will know the Ten Commandments but not the Socratic method. They will quote Leviticus but struggle with algebra. This is not education. This is catechesis by another name.
Of course, the defenders will point to the 'Judeo-Christian heritage' of America. But heritage is not instruction. One can admire the Sistine Chapel without believing in the Creation. One can read Dante without fearing Hell. The difference between a cultured mind and a dogmatic one is the ability to step back, to question, to doubt. Texas, by mandating the Bible, has chosen dogma over doubt.
Meanwhile, the UK’s secular push offers a glimpse of an alternative future. A future where children learn about all faiths and none. Where they study the history of religion without being required to pray. Where reason, not revelation, guides the curriculum. It is not a perfect system—no system is—but it is a system that values inquiry over indoctrination.
Texas will no doubt argue that it is merely restoring moral fibre to a decaying society. But moral fibre is not woven from ancient texts alone. It is forged in the crucible of debate, of science, of art. To reduce morality to a single book is to impoverish it. The Victorians understood this: they read the Bible, but they also read Darwin, Mill, and Marx. They debated. They evolved. Texas seems intent on reversing that evolution.
In the end, this is not about religion. It is about power. The power to define what is true, what is good, what is worth knowing. And when a state mandates that power be handed to a single text, it is not educating its children. It is conscripting them into a culture war. The UK should take note: this is what happens when you let the zealots drive the bus. And Texas should remember: even the most devout empire eventually falls.
