CHURCH CONGRESS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVII, Issue 106, 7 May 1896, Page 2

CHURCH CONGRESS.

INTERESTING PAPERS ON *. RELIGIOUS EDUCATION."

The Diocesan Church Congress wasresumed yesterday afternoon ab 3 30 in the lecture room of the V..M.C.A. In the absence of Mr R. Udy, the chair was occupied by His Lordship Bishop Cowie. Among those seated in bhe body of the hall,were Revs, G. B. Monro and T. F. Robertson, Presbyterian ministers.

The business of the afternoon was the reading of ben-minute papers on " Religious Education" as follows :—"ln tho Home," Yen. Archdeacon Dudley and Mr Samuel Luke ; "In the Church," Rev. Canon Nelson, M.A. and Mr V. E. Rice; "In the Day School," Rev. Percy Smailfield and Mr Theo. Cooper. "IS THE HOME." i The Yen. Archdeacon Dudley, in his | paper, said that religious education, in the Christian sense of the term, included the ; leading forth of the mind of the young into the recognition and fear and love of God as an ever-presenb and most gracious Father. Tho sphere in which the work was to bo begun was in the home. Faithfully and wisely attended to there, the parb of religious education that appertains to tho school and' to the Church was made,*;'-comparatively easy. Neglected there, it was more difficult, in Bchool and church alike. The home should be consecrated by united religious acts from the time of murriage. Visitors and domestics should find in it a cheerfulness tempered by seriousness, a fellowship of which the demonstrations need nob bo ostensible, a daily reading of the Script tures and prayer and praise. Ab an early stage of a child's life the work of teaching religious truths might be done day by day, a little at a time. Ten minutes prayers before breakfast ought, to be held in families. The child should be made to repeab daily a short psalm or versa of Scripture or hymn until they knew thorn by heart, tho catechism and ail things neces sary to be known. It was amazing how much might bo taught in a daily ten minutes. The father should never send bhe young children bo church alone, but. bake bhem himself when old enough, and to a Suuday-sc.iool too. He should bo on his guard not to make religion and religious teaching burdensome. Unkind things aboub neighbours, disparaging words aboub the services or the clergymen, and jokes about sacred things were usosb undesirable for children to bear. .Parents should remember that example with children above all was more telling than precept, as e.g. in the case of that New Zealand little boy who asked his father " Dad, how Boon will I be old enough to stay at home from church on Sundays like you do ?" The custom of grace at meals should be retained as well as that of family prayer once a day. The greatest care should be taken as to the books in the homo. Above all there should be felt a spirit of love diffused through tho home, a sweet constraint. No home was like tho Christian home. Train up a child in tho way in ivhich ib should go, and he would nob deparb from it.

Mr Luke followed. He said in bis paper that the influence that cultivates the heart and draws tho young soul to God mast begin ab home. That was God's law, and it could nob be altered. Parents, and especially mothers, stood ab the fountain head of a child's educabion, and upon them more than upon any other hang tho destines, nob only of their children, but of the country in which they lived. Wibh paronts chiefly restgd the grave and momentous responsibility of training children to become good, citizens. Godappointed family life was the true foundation of a nation's greatness. The ties of family life were, .of God's binding, and they weie absolutely necessary for the welfare of mankind, and if over in this. country family lite should languish or decay, as" Sbtre rb rtighb followed day, would our country languish and decay. Tho groat duty of religious education rested with the parents, and to fchein we musb look for the future of this country, They wore the main factors in malting this country a great and good land. Without godliness in the family there could be no greatness in the nation. The education which shaped a child for his or her duties as a man or woman, and a citizen, was that, which he or she gob from his or hor home. Ib was the home teaching not bhe public school which moulded the child's nabure. The teaching, the example, the words, tho way of life, of the Barents, form the character of the child. Did parents fully recognise their responsibilities and privileges? Parents often complained aboub their children, how bad associations were corrupting them, and our public schools were blamed, often unjustly. Bub the very serious question arose : Are nob parents nowadays as much in fault as their children, of whom they complained? To put io more plainly, were nob the paronts' sins too often the cause of their children's ems. The merely lip religion of the present day, the dying out faith in the living God and His everliving government oE this world, tho growing disbelief of tho life of God in the soul of man, the lifo of God in the individual and the life of God in society, was responsible for a good deal of the irreverence of their children and tho evils of society, ib was lamentable to consider the growing neglect of the teaching of the Church catechism in their homes, and, he was afraid, even in some of the Sunday-schools. Parents should be careful in directing their children to read wholesomo literature. Let them read the sbories in Holy Scripture, and, above all, thab Bweeb story of old when Jesus was here among men ; let them read such books as Kingsley's " Waber Babies," with its dear and good fairies ; " Mrs Do As You Would Be Done By " and " Mrs Be Done By As You Did;" Dickon's'" Old Curiosity Shop," wibh its exquisite conception of Litble Nell ; " Tom Brown's School Days;" Thackeray's "Esmond" and "The Newcomes," bhepuronovolaof WalterScobt, and then, when they became young mon and young women, they would read and appreciate their Shakespere and Milton, bho poems of Tennyson and of thab great and holy man \Vm. Wordsworth, who would teach them that Nature is not dead, but peopled with the lifo of Deity, that God may be seen in the stars and flowers, and His voice heard in the winds; and in after life they would find in Wordsworth a spiritual comradeship thab no other poeb could give. The modern yellow book, the degradiug and disgusting sex novels, would then bo cast away as unclean things. We might talk and boast of national prosperity and free institutions, bub unless our hearths and homes conbiuued safe and sound we should most certainly become degraded as a country, and no commercial success or contrivance of politicians would help us. Mr Luke was applauded several times during the reading of the paper. "IN THE CHURCH." Rev. Canon Nelson read his paper. He pointed outthabif people do nobregardpulpib utterances as amongst bhe first factors in religious education in bhe Church, then, in his opinion, they mistake one of the functions of the pulpib, and thab by no means of the least importance. The preparation and training of those who are to teach in such responeible positions as pulpits should be of the best, of the 80t_n'.--', of the rnosb thorough, Parents ivu-,. forgetful of the fact that bho Sunday-school could never, in the limited time at its disposal, supply the blank and blob which the preeenb system of state education had suffered to exist. A hindrance in the matter of religious education in. the church was the matter of teachers. Religious edacatioa was left to

the voluntary - efforts of a few in each district. Ha would submit for consideration whether the time had not arrived when the General Synod should nob devise plans for tho betber equipment of teachers, bheir regular supply, thir increasing htneas for the task.

Mr V. E. Rice, in hia paper, said that if they wanted young people to grasp the truths of Christianity and to learu the truths of a holy life let them take care thab the truths and rules were presented to their minds in an orderly aDd intelligible manner, unimpaired by defective expressions and unobscured by attempted explanation of the supernatural. .If it were possible bo curtail the length of their services and increase the number he believed ib would tend to very greatly increase the number of church attendants, old as well as young. • pon the subject of Sunday-schools he offered two words : — (1) Could nob some of; the time devoted to the learning and repetition of hymns be more profitably occupied in beaching the construction and use of the prayer book. (2) Was there not in bhe system of competition for prizes a danger of encouraging undue desire for pre-eminence and distinction. While ib belonged to the ordained clergy specially by divine commission to teach the truths of Christianity, to the laiby also belonged bhe duty of spreading and upholding the truth. The influence of their words and actions upon the young who hear and see them was immense. Should they then wonder if bhe habitual levity and irreverence of some, the arrogant intolerance of others, or the careless indifference of a third class of persons should sow bhe seed of like habit among their children. If the Church of England was to survive it muss be by the love and loyalty of its laity as well as by the exertions of its clergy. "in the day school." Rev. Percy Smailfield, in the course of his paper, pointed out thab the teacher in the day school had many advantages not enjoyed by the Sunday ecuool teacher. He could mooe easily have his class under control, he was better able to use the many mechanical aids to teaching which had been suggested by the experience of tho age or furnished by modern inventiveness. The motto for the teachers should be " Illustrate, illustrate, illustrate." A chapter in Old or New Testament, carefully taught, illustrated by model chart, black board, story description, would be the lesson best liked of all the lessons of the day. Tho children, far from disliking Bible teaching, would learn to love it. The teacher must aim at making bis lesson attractive. Lob the teacher teach the Bible history and tho catechism. Lay a good foundation in the history of the Bible and then use the facts to illustrate and lead up to the essential truths sob forbh in the Catechism. In the lower claaseß of the school the objecb of the teacher should bo to cover a great deal of ground, and bo cover the same ground oiten. In the higher classes the aim should be to touch one or two or at the most three books of tho Bible in tho year. Teach the child Bible history alone. The wise teacher would try to give a religious education as well. The tougher in the day school should beach Bible history and the Catechism.

In the absence of Mr Theo. Cooper, at Wellington, His Lordship called on Mr C. J. Parr to read the paper prepared by Mr Cooper oq " Religious Education in the Day School." Mr Cooper in his paper protested against the introduction ot the religious element into the public schools. He said that to his mind one of the worst things that could happen to their children would be tho separation which would become manifest if Bible reading or religious instruction were introduced with a conscience clause. How natural ab once would bo the division. Tho children from one family would nob attend because their father was a Theosophist, from another because he was a Roman Catholic, from a third because ho did not believe in the authenticity of the Gospols, from a fourth because ho was a Jew, and bo on.. And bo there would be engendered in the minds of the children sectarian prejudices and illfeeling. Some would point the finger of scorn at others, and the schools would be separated into as many divisions as there were sects. What, he asked, would all this lead to? He said emphatically, denominationalism, State aid to private schools, and State aid to denominational schools, and, for his part, he could conceive of no greater injury to the community than a destruction of the present system of State education, and tho erection of a system of denominationalism. He believed the vast majority of the people were againsb denominational education, and he also firmly belioved that upon a full consideration of the proposal for religious instruction in bhe State schools the vast majority of thinking people would reject such a proposition (1) because the State had no such duty to perform, (2) because no system of free and compulsory State educabion could be otherwise than secular, and (3) Biblo reading in schools must inevitably lead to denominational educotion. There was no necessity for the agitation. The schoolmaster had the children only for 25 hours out of the week. Let parents do their duty.to their children. Let those whoso duty it. was to supervise the spiritual interests of the young do their duty, and the cry thab our children were without religious knowledge, thab their future was imperilled by a godless system of educabion would cease. Tho cry was a false one. He believed a grave injustice was done to their children and to their teachers, Their children were not godless, they were nob in tho main irreverent or irreligious, and by far the greater number of them bad, he believed, either by home braining or through the Sunday schools, the Christian Endeavour Society, or other agency, sound and sufficient instruction in the Scripture and in the teachings of Christ.

Discussion was invited, when Archdeacon Willis rose, and in the course of some remarks said if a religious foundation was taught in the public schools, they would have something on which to build their Sunday-school instructions.

The Rev. Mr Curzon-Siggera said thab he had read the congress reports year by year as they were held in other countries, bub he had now to congratulate Hie Lordship in having presided over a congress ab which papers were read which could nob be excelled ab any congress. If Mr Luke would lend him his paper, he would preach ib as a sermon next Sunday, and recommend the congregation to inwardly digest and practice its principles, and ho hoped they would continue to raise up congresses able to. produce such excellent papers. (Applause.) Mr R. Udy apologised for not being present at the opening, being detained at bhe Board of Educabion meeting. He said there was no doubt that at present religious education in bhe public schools was a burning question, but it was a stumbling block, and she difficulty was Such as it was impossible to ge- over in scattered districts. He had read the Irish text book, and he had a very strong objection to certain passages in ib. They had 750 teachers, who, no doutft, represented all denominations, and some belonging to no denomination, bub he believed if this agitation was pursued ib would ehd in tho introduction of denominationalnm, and it would have been better that it never was started. Ib would split up the schools. They had now 100 country schools, the average attendance ab which was 25, and as a rule there wero at least three denominations in these Schools. In centres of population this system might be introduced, but in out districts it could not be done without serious injury to bhe children, tie noticed that every speaker and every paper read had missed the fact that religious instruction ct.B be gives ia the public schools out

of school hours. It had been done m several schools wibh success, and he dia nofwsebwhvibshouldnobbe done in other cases, but if ib resulted in cutting the schools it would be a very serious disaster indeed. ~, The other speakers wero Mr Templer, h.. Eugster, Revs. F. Larkias, P. Walsh, and W. E. Lush.