For A Level Religious Studies, students follow the specification from OCR. The title of the course is ‘Christianity, Philosophy and Ethics’.

(Many other schools and colleges will refer to this only as Philosophy and Ethics A Level; this is misleading. If this is the way it is presented in a post 16 prospectus you should be aware that the wording on the A Level Certificate will say ‘Religious Studies’. There is no such A Level course offered by any exam board simply called Philosophy and Ethics and as of September 2016, all Religious Studies courses have to contain the study of theology from at least one major world faith.)

Over the duration of the course students complete units;

The Philosophy of Religion

• Ancient philosophical influences including Plato and Aristotle
• The existence of God including classical arguments from observation and reason
• Experience of God including ‘religious experience’ and ‘the problem of evil’
• Theological and philosophical understanding of God including concepts such as omniscience and freewill
• Religious language; understanding and modern debate

Varying Religious and Non-Religious Approaches to Ethical Theories

• The religious approaches of natural moral law and situation ethics
• The normative approaches of Kantian and Utilitarianism ethics
• Applied ethics including issues such as euthanasia and business ethics
• Ethical language
• Significant ideas behind ethical theory including Aquianas’ theological approach and Freud’s contribution from psychology
• Further development in ethical though regarding the ethics of sex

Development of Christian Thought

• Theories of insight including Augustine’s view of human nature
• Death and the afterlife
• Knowledge of God’s existence
• The person of Jesus
• Christian moral principles and action
• Religious pluralism and secularism
• Religion, gender and society