The Education Question

New Zealand Tablet, 18 October 1906, Page 9

The Education Question

We do not commit ourselves-to the- scheme outlined by our friend, Mr. J. A. Scott, M.A., in the letter which appears on pp. 11-12 of this issue. But we do commend it to our readers as a thoughtful and well-intended effort by a scholarly and observant layman to get the various religious denominations in New Zealand more ' aux prises ' with the education difficulty, and to drag the whole question, without needless delay, within the focus of practical politics.

* In our issue of July 15, 1898, and on many occa* sions since then, we urged constan-t, never-ceasing action to push our claims an-d to educate public opinion thereon— to spread right views of our demands among non-Catholics, and to get hold of the ear of the electors who are out of range of the Catholic paper an-d of -the voice of the Catholic preacher. In this, as in all educative movements that are to lead prejudice and misconception captive, 'it is dogged as wins '. The path that leads to success is the old plebeian one of rugged, persevering, and organised effort. ' The secret of success ', says Disraeli, 'is constancy of purpose '. Constancy in self-sacrifice has dotted our country over with the evidences of Catholic charity and given us a practical monopoly of religious education. It is the best earnest of a capacity for constancy of purpose in other and allied, though less strenuous, direc Lions. In the matter of the political pressing of our educational demands we might, for instance, learn much from a certain League among our Protestant fellow-colonists. Between us and them there are grounds of solid agreement as well as points of serious divergence of view. We are, for instance, in substantial agreement with them as to the principle of religion and .of a religious atmosphere in the school. We differ in the application of the principle. We push the principle to its practical and legitimate conclusion-. They do not— as yet. They maltreat the principle* by trimming, lopping, and shaping it to fit the seeming expediency- or doctrinal compromise of the hour,. We freely accord to others the educational) rights which we "claim for ourselves. They do not—as yet. We know our mind, and have over and over again set forth the broad minimum of right and justice which would satisfy our legitimate demands. They are tossed about by every shifting wind of expediency, boxing the compass of variable opinion and contention— 4 One foot on sea and one on shore, To one thing • constant never ' • A patient of Sir Dominic Corrigan's was once tossing, turn-ing, and straining under the stress pf an internal pain. « Oh, Sir Dominic ', he exclaimed, 'is there any position that will give me relief ? ' 'if there is ', said the great surgeon, ' you're .very likely to find it '. The incessant changes of position taken. up"by the Bibl«-in-schools people are, to our ihinds, one of the xeally hopeful features of, the situation. It . may lead to the discovery that the one position which thus far, they have been ignoring or avoiding, is just the one in which they will find relief. So far their

ignoring of the .Catholic claims has only helped to make their movement a forlorn hop*. As matters stand, it is generally recognised that the introduction of any (Protestant) Bible-in-schools scheme would have for its , natural and inevitable -corollary the satisfaction of the Catholic educational demands. And this conviction' has been enormously strengthened by the pronouncements of our Hierarchy on the Bible-in-schools scheme. Some people learri, as some people joke, •« wi' deeficulty \ But so obvious a lesson cannot fail to maTce an impression upon our Protestant fellow-colonists who are at one with us in deploring the hard secularism of our- system of public instruction. The moral, 'to -be learned from it is this : that there can be no settlement of the education difficulty in which Catholics are not treated as • principals, and no settlement in which just and concurrent' count as not taken of our -demands. , All treaties of peace are shaped between the hammer and anvil of discussion. And such confer- ' ences as our esteemed correspondent advocates arc (apart from their details, to which we do not commit ourselves) in full accord with the principles and methods- of action advocated by us in our issue ofi July 15, 1898. In this matter, too, we are not moving in the dark, as we have satisfactory, though, diverse, solutions of the religious 'education problem legalised in Canada, (iermany, and elsewherp. The cause we have in hands— that of fhb Christian upbringing of youth— is a sacred trust. . Catholics will not fail of sacrifice for it. But it needs pushing in its political aspect. And this is not to be achieved by the timid silence and inactivity that are liable to be interpreted to mean loss of faith or hope in our cause, or a sense of inability to present it adequately before our fellow-countrymen, or a lack of trust in their sense of justice, or tame acquiescence in a great national wrong.