The perception is that religious education is just for children, but that's not the case. It would be unfair to leave the adults out. It's for the whole family, the community. We're always encouraged to have everyone join in and grow in their faith.

The power of the American system of republicanism lies in its capacity to allow religious belief to be a competing, not a controlling, factor in American life.

The Pandit, the religious scholar, proclaims the Vedas, but he is slow to act on them

The protests have absolutely nothing to do with the show. There's no question that the people who are trying to promote extreme religious agendas scan the media for opportunities to make a fuss. No one who saw the show objected to it on Christian grounds - when we were developing it there was no controversy at all. What happened is that when it was going to go on telly they thought, 'If we make a fuss by demonstrating outside the BBC then we can get lots of media coverage.' It's very confusing because it means people go to see it with the wrong expectations.

There are many parallels. In the United States, we recently had two different Supreme Court rulings concerning the posting of the Ten Commandments, ... The connections may not be as obvious as religious dimensions playing out in the drafting of the constitution in Iraq, but we can see many examples of difficulties in trying to draw the lines that separate religion and politics.