THE POPE ON EDUCATION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VI, Issue 279, 6 September 1878, Page 3

THE POPE ON EDUCATION.

THK following letter, which We take from the Catholic JZeview, is too important and pertinent for us not to give it in its entirety, and without division : — " Letter of His Holiness Pope Leo XIII. to the Lord Cardinal Monaco La Valetta, Vicar-General of Eome. " Lord Cardinal, — In the midst of the reasons for joy and comfort which from the first days of our Pontificate we had in great number, by the undoubted significations of reverence and of affection which came to us from all parts of the world, there were not wanting to us grave bitternesses by the general condition of the Church, submitted as it were throughout to the fierce persecution, and by what we saw happen in the very City of Eome, the centre of Catholicity and the august See of the Vicar of Christ. Here an unbridled press and journals continually intent on combating the faith with sophism and derision, and impugning the sacred laws of the Church and lessenin^ts authority ; here temples of Protestants erected by the gold of Biple societies even in the most populous streets as if by way of . insult ; here schools, asylums and hospices opened to incautious youth with the apparently philanthropic intention of assisting in the culture of the mind and in their material wants, but with the real purpose of forming of them a generation inimical to religion and the Church of Christ. And as if all that were slight, through the work of those who by duty of their office are bound to promote the true interests of the Roman citizens, the banishment of the Catholic Catechism from the Eoman schools was recently decreed. A provision worthy of reprobation, which takes away likewise this dike against heresy and furious unbelief, and leaves the way open to anew kind of foreign invasion, so much more fatal and perilous than the ancient, as it more directly tends to snatch from the heart of the Eomans the precious treasure of faith and the fruits which are derived from it. This new attempt against the religion and piety of our people fills our soul with a keen and pungent sorrow, and constrains us to write to you, Lord Cardinal, who fill our place in the spiritual government of Eome, the present letter on the dolorous subject, to recall it to mind loudly in the presence of God and of men. " And here from the very beginning, in virtue of our pastoral ministry, it is needful for us to remind every Catholic of the very grave duty which by the natural and the Divine law is incumbent upon him of instructing his offspring in the supernatural truths of faith, and the obligation which, in a Catholic city binds those who rule its destinies to facilitate and further its fulfilment. And whilst in the name of religion we raise our voice for the guardianship of its

most sacred rights, we wish likewise that it may be made clear how contrary this thoughtless decision may be to the interests of society itself. " For certain it cannot be imagined what pretext had been able to counsel such a measure, except, perhaps, that unreasonable and pernicious indifference in matters of religion, in which some desire that the people should grow up. Until now reason and natural good sense itself taught men to set aside and put out of use that which had not in practice made good trial, or which had become useless through changed circumstances. But who can affirm that the teaching of the Catechism has not given good proof even until now ? Was it not religious instruction which renewed the world, which sanctified and polished the mutual relations of men, which made the moral sense more delicate, and educated that Christian conscience which morally represses excesses, reproves injustice, and raises the people who are faithful above all others. Perhaps it will be said that the social conditions of the age in which we live have rendered it useless and noxious ? But the safety and prosperity of nations has no secure guardianship outside of truth and justice, of which the present society so keenly feels the need, and to which the Catholic Catechism preserves their sacred rights fully intact. Through love, however, for the precious fruits which have already been gathered, and which aTe rightly hoped for from this teaching, it should not be banished from the public schools, but it should rather be promoted with every effort. . " And likewise the nature of the child and the wholly special conditions in which we live require this. By no compact can the judgment of Solomon be renewed on the child, and he divided by an unreasonable and cruel division between his intelligence and his will ; whilst if one undertake to cultivate the first, it is necessary to direct the second to the acquisition of virtuous habits and of the final end. Whoever in education neglects the will, concentrating all efforts to the culture of the mind, ends by making instruction a perilous weapon in the hands of the wicked. It is the subject of the mind which is added to malevolence and power, against which no remedy is available. " And the thing appears so clear that those very persons who wish to exclude religious instruction from the school would recognise it, even at the cost of contradiction ; which persons do not limit their efforts to the intelligence alone, but extend them likewise to the will, causing an ethical system which they call civil and natwal to be taught in the schools, and directing the young in the acquirement of social and citizen virtues, Put, besides that a morality formed cannot guide man to the very high end to which he is destined by the Divine goodness in the Beatific Vision of God, it has not at all sufficient force over the mind of the child to educate him to virtue and to keep him strong in well-doing ; nor does it answer to the true necessities of man which are felt, for man is a religious animal in the same mode that he is a social animal, and no progress of science can ever pluck out from his soul the most profound roots of religion and of faith. Why, then, not make use of the Catholic Catechism to educate the hearts of the young to virtue, in which the most perfect mode and the most fruitful seed of a sound education are found ? " The teaching of the Catechism ennobles and raises man in his own esteem, inducing him at the same time to respect himself and others. It is a great misfortune that many of those who pass sentence on the Catechism, on leaving the schools had put away in f orgetf ulness, and do not consider what they had learned from the Catechism in their infant years. Otherwise it would have been easy enough for them to understand how, by teaching to the child that he issues from the hands of God, the fruit of the. love which He freely bestowed on him ; that all that he sees is ordered by Him, King and Lord of the creation ; that he is so great and worth so much that the Eternal Son of God, to redeem him, did not disdain to take his flesh ; that with the blood of the Man-God his forehead is bathed in baptism : that of the flesh of the Divine Lamb his spiritual life is nourished : that the Holy Spirit, dwelling in him as in His living temple, inspires in him life and virtue thoroughly divine ; it is the same which gives him efficacious impulses to keep the glorious quality of Son of God, and to honour that quality with virtuous behaviour. They would understand, likewise, that it is possible to expect all great things from a child who in the school of the Catechism learns that he is destined for a most high end in the vision and in the love of God ; that he is, in fact, taught to watch continually over himself, and comforted with all manner of help in sustaining the war which his implacable enemies wage against him ;*that he is urged to be docile and subject, learning to venerate in his parents the image of the Father who is in heaven, and in the prince the authority which comes from God, and from God takes ita reason to exist and its majesty ; that he is drawn to respect in his brethren the divine likeness which shines upon his own forehead, and to recognise under the miserable exterior of the poor the very Eedeemer ; that he is saved in time from doubts and uncertainties by the benefit of the Catholic teaching power (inagistero) ; that it bears the titles of its infallibility and authenticity in its divine origin, in the prodigious fact of its establishment on earth and in the abundance of the most sweet and salutary fruits which it brings. Finally, they would understand that Catholic morality, furnished with the fear of chastisement and with the certain hope of high rewards, does not incur the fate of that civil ethics which they would substitute for the religious ; nor would they have ever taken the fatal resolution of depriving the present generation of so many and of such precious advantages, by banishing from the school the teaching of the Catechism. " And we say lanishing, since the disposition taken of preparing the religious instruction solely for those children, for whom their parents make it an express demand, is thoroughly vain. It cannot indeed be understood how the authors of the ill-omened disposition may not have been aware of the sinister impression which should be made upon the mind of the child in seeing religious instruction placed in conditions so diverse from the others. The child who to be stimulated to a diligent study has need of knowing the importance and the necessity of that which is taught to him, what pledge can he have for an instruction, towards which the scholastic authority shows itself either cold or hostile, tolerating it unwillingly ? And then if there were (as it is not difficult to find them) parents who either

through wickedness of mind, or much more through ignorance and negligence, should not think of seeking for their children the benefit of religious instruction, a great number of young people would remain deprived of the most salutary precepts, with extreme damage not only to these innocent souls, but to civil society itself. And matters being in such extremes, would it not be a duty of whosoever presides over the school to remedy the malice or negligence of others ? Hoping for advantages less marked undoubtedly, it was lately thought to render elementary instruction compulsory by law, constraining, even with fines, the parents to send their children to school ; and now how could anyone have at heart to withdraw religious instruction from young Catholics, which is indubitably the soundest guarantee of a wise and virtuous direction given to life? Is it not a cruelty to pretend that these children should grow up without ideas and sentiments of religion, until having reached fervid adolescence they find themselves face to face with flattering and violent passions, disarmed, destitute of every curb, with the certainty of being dragged into the slippery paths of crime? It is a torture for our paternal heart to behold the lamentable consequences of this inconsiderate deliberation ; and our torture is embittered, since to-day the incitements to every sort of vice are stronger and more numerous, You, Lord Cardinal, who in your high office of our Vicar follow closely the developement of the war which is waged against God and the Church in our Rome, know well, without our speaking of it at length, what and how many are the perils of perversion which youth encounters : doctrines which are pernicious and subversive of all constituted order, audacious and violent propositions to the prejudice and discredit of all legitimate authoiity ; finally, immorality, which, without hindrance, proceeds openly in a thousand ways to contaminate the eyes and corrupt the heart. " When these and similar assaults are made against faith and morals, each can judge for himself how opportunely the moment has bscn selected to drive away religious education from public schools. Perchance it is desired with these disposition, instead of that Roman people, which was celebrated for its faith throughout the world from Apostolic times, and up to the present day was admired for the vigor and the religious culture of its morals, to form a people without religion and dissolute, and to lead it thus to the condition of barbarism and savagery ? And in the midst of this people, perverted with remarkable disloyalty, how could the Vicar of Jesus Christ, the master of all the faithful, see his supreme authority revered, hold with honour his august See, and expect the charges of his Pontifical Ministry respected and tranquil ? Behold, Lord Cardinal, the condition, which in part has already been made to us, and which is prepared for us in the future, if the merciful God will not place a limit to this continuance of attempts, the one more to be reprobated than the other. " But as long as Providence by its adorable judgments allows this trial to last, if it be not in our power to change the condition of things, it is nevertheless our duty to use every effort to mitigate it, in order that its evil effects may be rendered less sensible. Hence it is needful that not only the parish priests shonld redouble their diligence and zeal in the teaching of the Catechism, but that they should supply by new and efficacious means the void which is caused by the fault of others. We do not doubt but that the clergy of Rome will not be at all this time behind in the sacred duties of their sacerdotal ministry, and that they may employ themselves with the most affectionate care in preserving the Roman youths from the dangers which their faith and their morality run. We are certain, likewise, that the Catholic associations flourishing in this city with so much advantage to religion, will concur with all the means placed in their hands in the holy undertaking of preventing that this holy city, losing the sacred and august character of religion, and the envied boast of being the Holy City, should become the victim of error and the theatre of unbelief. And you, Lord Cardinal, with the sagacity and firmness with which you are adorned, may procure that oratories and schools may be increased, where the young may be gathered together and instructed concerning the most holy Catholic religion, in which, by a particular grace of heaven, they have been born. Seek, according as it has already been done with good fruit in some churches, that virtuous and charitable laymen, under the vigilance of one or more priests, may lend their labour in the teaching of the Catechism to the children, and procure that the parents be exhorted by the respective parish priests to send their children, and that they may be reminded likewise of the duty — which is incumbent on all— requiring religious instruction in the schools of their children. It will be_ useful, likewise, to establish catechetical instructions for adults in the places which are believed to be most suitable, in order to keep their salutary teachings alive in the minds which have learned them in their childhood. Never fail to enkindle the piety and to direct still better the oledge of the priests and of the laity, placing before their eyes the importance of the work, the merits which they will acquire before God, before us, and before the whole of society, and which we will study most laboriously to hold in due consideration. " Nor does it escape us finally that to succeed well in our intent the need of material means likewise occurs, which do not answer in proportion to the necessities. . But, if we, constrained to live on the alms of the faithful, placed themselves in great straits by the present dark and struggling times, cannot bestow as much as our heart could wish, we will not howevtr cease to do all that which will be possible to us, to turn away the evil effect which comes from neglected religious education, first to the child and then to civil society itself. " For the rest, in all our desires and cares it is necessary to send upward the invocation of the "Divine help, without which every hope of a happy result is vain. We turn, meanwhile, to you. Lord Cardinal, recommending you warmly to exhort the Roman people to raise to the Lord our God fervent prayers., that in this holy city the light of the Catholic faith may be maintained entire, which the heretical sects, welcomed with honour, would pretend to obscure or wholly extinguish, and together with the impieties are plotting to overthrow this most firm Rock, against which, as it is written, the gates of hell will not prevail. In the heart of the Romans the devotion towards the Immaculate Mother of the Saviour is ancient ; but now, the dan - gcr pursuing still more, let them recur both more frequently and with more intense ardour to her who crushed the serpent and conquered

all heresies. In the days which recall the solemn memory of the glorious Apostles Peter and Paul, let them prostrate themselves reverently in their basilicas, and conjure them to intercede to God for the city -which they sanctified by their own blood, and which they made the depository of their ashes— a pledge, as it were, of their constant protection. Let them make gentle violence of supplication to the celestial patrons of Rome, who, either with their blood, or with the works of Apostolic ministry, or with holy examples, rendered more firm in the hearts of their fathers the faith which is sought to be torn from the bosoms of their sons ; and God will be moved with pity towards us, nor will He let His religion be made a laughing stock to wicked men. " Meanwhile receive, Lord Cardinal, the Apostolic Benediction, which from the depths of our hearts we impart to you, to the clergy, and to all our dearly belored people. " Leo XIII. , P.P. " From the Vatican, the 26th of June, 1878."