RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS BILL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22328, 31 July 1934, Page 5

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION IN SCHOOLS BILL

I VQ I'HE tI'ITOB Sir,—l have read with' some amusement the laboured statement of the New Zealand Educational Institute, elaborating the objections of teachers to this Bill, and, like many another plain person, I cannot help asking: Why all this verbiage? Why not be candid and straightforward and say plainly that the majority of primary school teachers do not desire religious instruction in schools, have no sympathy .with it, and will not have it if they can help it. Then.we all know just where we are, but all this " beating the dusty drum denominational," and magnifying the difficulties and the delicate susceptibilities of the conscientious objector is merely a verbal smoke screen hiding the real position. Let me strongly urge that in such an issue honesty is the best policy. Why not admit that, although the advent of Christianity is the central fact in European history, that has nothing to do with primary school teaching, and. although the English Bible is admittedly the foundation of English literature, any acquaintance with its magnificent prose is quite unnecessary in passing any of the standards? Of what earthly consequence is it to a primary school teacher or his pupils that Western civilisation, especially in the British Empire, has been much more profoundly influenced by the Hebrew than by the Hellenic culture? What does it matter that the moral sanctions behind our laws and conduct derive directly from the New Testament? What have moral sanctions to do with primary school teachers? Their business is with proficiency certificates, and. to put it bluntly, the whole education system, whose they are and whom they serve, promotes and idealises "instruction," which it continually confuses with " education." I hope it will not be thought that I am adopting the ironical attitude or that 1 am blaming the teachers who apparently consider that their craft is in danger. They are the natural product ■of the secular system. All I plead for is candour and plain dealing. Why not recognise that, while we are nominally a Christian nation, bur aims and ideals are materialistic? Why not admit that, to the very great majority of New Zealanders the whole philosophy of life is summed up in the conjugation of the verb "to take," instead of "to give," and that therefore there can be no genuine sympathy with a religious code which incul-' cates the opposite ami, consequently, no room for it in the primary school syllabus. Nevertheless, this does not absolve the supporter of Bible-reading in schools from testifying as vigorously as. possible to the necessity for religious teaching, both in day schools and in Sunday schools. They 'may belong to the unpopular minority, but in view of the decay of religious observances in the home and in society in general their duty is obvious. — I am, etc.. Plain Deai.kr.