BIBLE READING IN SCHOOLS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22878, 5 November 1937, Page 15

BIBLE READING IN SCHOOLS

Sir, —Mr. E. 0. Bla mires lays it down that "Justice requires that provision be made for the teacher or parent who holds that no education is sound that is devoid of religion and makes no use of the Bible." 1 would remind him of the position held by the Catholic Church, namely, that any kind of education given npart from Catholic doctrine and the atmosphere of Catholic worship is ungodly, fruitless and injurious. I would ask him, does justice require that provision be made in the national system of a community such as ours for Catholic teachers and parents? If not, why not? Can he deny that the. religious exercises nqw introduced by permission of education boards are, by omission, Protestant in type? Would it not be more in accordance with justice i!r those Protestant parents who conscientiously believe that the present system is unchristian and godless would make provision for the instruction of their children in their own type of Christianity at their own cost, as their Catholic fellow citizens have done with infinite self-sacrifice, paying a double debt to the Secular State and to tlteir conscientious convictions? Opponents of the Bible in Schools League are of opinion, and surely they have constitutional principle on their side, that the question of religious instruction in public schools is not open to the decision ol the parents, but that, being a subject of national policy, the decision lies with the community. The community, by national vote, has affirmed the policy of limiting the school curriculum by the omission of subjects that touch on the religious differences which make such wide cleavages in the bo'dy politic. Mr. Blamires has described in what manner the league has manoeuvred to introduce Protestant religions exercises, not indeed into the curriculum, but practically into the school hours; and how that has been done under authority given school committees to grant the use. of school buildings for moral and religions purposes outside the hours fixed by the boards. I should like to ask by what standard of social ethics does the league defend the legal subterfuge which cajjs the five minutes of religious exorcises from 9 to 9.5 outside the school hours? By what standard of social ethics does it defend its method of "smashing the secular system," and of defeating the national will, deliberately adopted and expressed in Ihe Hducati'.m Acts? One would expect a league that advocates the adoption of religious teaching to set a civic example; and surely the highest standard of social ethics demands that the intention of the law should be obeyed until by open agitation and national vote a change of polling be effected and expressed. William Jellie, Ranfurly Terrace.