A Dialogical Epistemology for Catholic Religious Education: Disciplinary Identity and Educational Openness in Plural Societies

Growing religious and cultural pluralism has placed dialogue at the centre of the international debate on Religious Education (RE). Contemporary scholarship has emphasised its importance for the study of religions, personal development, freedom of conscience, democratic citizenship, and intercultural coexistence. Less attention has been paid to the relationship between the dialogical quality of RE and the epistemological structure of the school subject itself. This concept paper develops a theoretical and foundational argument through focused critical analysis of scholarship in Religious Education, curriculum theory, sociology of religion, and relevant theological and magisterial sources. Catholic Religious Education in Italy (Insegnamento della Religione Cattolica, IRC) serves as a conceptual laboratory for examining epistemological and pedagogical identity. The article interprets theology as the scientia rectrix of IRC and argues that the Christian understanding of Revelation as relational, dialogue with culture and the sciences, and recognition of religious otherness give the subject an intrinsically dialogical epistemological structure. Through pedagogical mediation, this structure gives rise to three educational implications: identity formation, anthropological openness, and hospitality as the pedagogical form of dialogicality. The Italian case offers a theoretical lens for reconsidering the relationship among disciplinary identity, dialogue, and pluralism across contemporary models of Religious Education.