Autodeterminación intelectual de menores en el ámbito religiosoa propósito de las discrepancias entre progenitores de la elección del centro escolar. Comentarios a la STC de 21 de febrero de 2024 (Recurso de amparo 4958-2021)

Abstract

The article analyses the terms in which the Constitutional Court, in one of its latest rulings, reiterates its doctrine on the recognition of minors as fully entitled to their rights. This is a key recognition for analysing how to guarantee minors a space for intellectual self-determination in the face of the religious phenomenon. And all of this within the framework of an appeal for protection filed by a mother against the judicial decision (order) in a voluntary jurisdiction procedure due to disagreements between the parents over the choice of school. The analysis is pertinent insofar as it allows us to enter into the constitutional discussion that the case raises, discarding other questions of ordinary legality, namely: constitutional support for the best interests of the minor, limits to the right of parents to choose the religious and/or moral education of their children, and how this is specified when choosing the school, delimitation of intellectual self-determination in the face of the religious phenomenon, application of the rules of weighting in a constitutional context, etc. Along the same lines, the study allows us to place at the centre of the legal-constitutional debate what is the purpose of the jurisdictional control of constitutionality via amparo appeals against the decisions of judicial bodies.