THE government’s first attempt to tell schools how they should teach religious education will spark controversy by recommending that children should be taught atheism as well as Christianity. The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), which regulates what is taught in schools, is drawing up new guidelines on the teaching of religious education. It intends to recommend a wider curriculum, including the teaching of agnosticism, humanism and atheism alongside Christianity, Islam and Hinduism. “It is very much the intention that young people in the context of religious education should be studying non- religious beliefs,” a spokesman for the QCA said. “There...