THE SECULAR PHASE OF OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXVII, Issue 12, 25 March 1909, Page 450

THE SECULAR PHASE OF OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM

A DISCUSSION

(By the Editor of the New Zealand Tablet.)

Thejf olio wing article on the above subject— the eleventh of the sciies — appeared in the Otuyo Daily Times of March 20: — XI.— THE CATHOLIC CLAIM. PART II.: WHAT IT IS. . In the first three articles -of -this series I set forth tlfe principles which underlie the Catholic attitude aiid the Catholic claim' in regard to. education. For. the sake of clearness it- will be necessary to recapihilate some" of these principles in summary form, referring the reader, for their fuller elucidation, to the articles mentioned above. Here, as throughout the whole course of these articles, I assume that I am discussing the education question with those who acknowledge at least tlie fundamental truths and principles of Christian faith and practice. With others a different line of treatment of the subject would be followed. 1. Catholic Principles /Summarised. — 1. Education is a preparation for life. Its processes are - determined ultimately by a philosophy of life. -The Catholic position *n regard to education has for its starting point the teaching of Christian philosophy and revealed religion in regard to the origin and the sublime and supernatural destiny of the child. 2. The child is heir to eternal happiness. All his faculties — physical, intellectual, moral, religious — were given to him as, in different ways and degrees, means to that great end. True education consists in the harmonious development and training of all these faculties. The most important part of that training is, naturally, that which tends most directly and immediately to the attainment of the chief purpose of the child's existence — namely, right conduct; in other words, the formation of habits of virtue and, through them, of character. To this all are called. To higli physical development and intellectual culture all are not called. 3. Religion is the vital influence which, far more than any other, produces virtue, inspires to noble conduct, moulds character on right lines. Right conduct or virtue' implies ' instruction of the intellect in the knowledge of our duty and its grounds, the cultivation of moral conscience and moral responsibility in the easy discernment of duty, and the building up of habits of virtue, or permanont dispositions of the will to act according to the dictates of the moral reason.' To Christians the knowledge of duty and its grounds comes through- religion. In the connection used here religion may be described as ' a body of truths or beliefs respecting God and our relations to Him; and, flowing from these, a collection of duties which have God for their primary object.' These duties towards God color and give a text for all other human duties. The doctrines define and provide an intelligent basis for duty; they also supply a powerful motive and a strong inducement fox the due performance of duty. The training of Christian children centres around Christ. He is the incomparably perfect ideal to place before them, the highest inspiration to noble thought and endeavor. Our ideas of right and wrong 'are iutimately bound up with His teaching. And faith in Him has transformed tho world 4. All education (including religious education) is a vital and continuous process. It is a training of faculties, analogous to that which is known as ' training ' in the world of athletics. It is not a matter of occasional jerks, or twitches, or spasms of enorgy, with seasons. of repose or collapse between. • For Christians that training (in virtue) lasts as long as our probation lasts — that is, till we pass the portals of death. The attainment of the great and sacred purpose of our life need not necessarily be always directly in view, nor be at all times consciously followed. But it must never be excluded or antagonised — for that means sin; and it must be the guiding principle and the great motive force of our lives. This is what is meant by ' the religious atmosphere,' which, in the Catholic idea, should pervade the life of the true Christian. This 'religious atmosphere' is demanded by Catholics as a vital factor in any system of education worthy of the name. This does not, of course, imply the continuous direct teachin"- and practice of religion throughout the school day; it means (in the words of Pope Leo XIII.) that the training of children ' must be permeated by religious principles.' 5. Professor Schiller and other scientific educationists I of the front rank insist on ' concentration and unity in

education. 5 Th«S three great agencies in education aro the home, the. scliool, the: church. In the vital matter of educating in religion and, virtue, the Catholic Church" has *ever stood for the now scientifically accepted principle of unity and concentration; she has ever required harmony in the pedagogical (training) action of home and church aivl school — each acting and reacting on the child in its own proper measure and way, and all on uniform principles. In other words, religion and religious training should enter into all the processes of education. In this materialising age, more than ever, should the child be taught to. find „ God in the school as well as in the church and' the homo and the boundless universe — and in Him to live, and move, : and have his being. These principles or education are not Catholic alone. They have been in possession from ages immemorial. They are, in varying degrees, and with many differences in detailed application, accepted by educators over the greater part of the Christian world. They must be deemed to be rightly in possession, until the contrary is shown. All rival and hostile systems are recent, experimental, localised, * and no one of them has thus far established its claim to accept- ■ ance on the basis of Christian philosophy and the prin- , ciples of pedagogy (child-training) — the only grounds on which they can claim a hearing from a Christian people. 11. Catholic Pbjnctpi/ES Applied. — In their practical application the Catholic principles of education sum marily stated above would, in the present writer's view, work out, for Catholic children, along the following general lines (at one stage, to be duly indicated, another Catholic principle would likewise come into operation) : — 1. There must not alone be instruction of the intellect of Catholic children in religious truths in the schools; there must also be instruction and training of the moral conscience and the will. 2. The instruction and the training mentioned above must, moreover — according to the opportunities of the schools and the several capacities of the children — be effective ; that is, they must be of their nature such as really to aid the child in attaining the great object of his existence. In other words, it must be a serious and genuine religious training. Hence — (a) The religious instruction and training of Catholic children must have a known and clear-cut object in view — namely, adequate training in virtue and character ; they must be based on definite religious truths and principles, after the manner of any art or science that is seriously taught — again, of course, according to the children's ages and relative capacities and the opportunities of school life. In connection with this deepest concern in life, this first and most important part of true education, Catholics cannot knowingly tolerate make-believe methods, or makeshift compromises, or ineffective principles of instruction or training, such as they would be unwilling to employ in home or church or Sunday school, or such as a skilled and conscientious teacher would be ashamed to follow in the case of (say) arithmetic or of any physical science. (b) Catholics insist upon giving to religion and charac-ter-formation their rightful pla.ee of first importance in education. They demand for Catholic children in the school the ' religious atmosphere ' in. the sense explained above. They will therefore not accept for their children any system that subordinates religious training to secular instruction. They will not accept as satisfactory for their children any system which provides some or any form of religion, no matter what it may be, at the opening or closing of the school only, or at some other set hour only, while God and religion and the play of religious principles and religious influences are excluded from the remainder of the working hours of the scliool. In this connection Pope Leo XIII. merely expressed the immemorial feeling of the Catholic world when he said in his .Encyclical on the centenary of Peter Canisius in 1897 : 'It is not enough for youths to be taught religion at fixed hours, but all their training must be permeated by religious principles.' Hence Catholics could never accept, for their children,, any compromise effected between religion and secularism, such as took plaea under the old Otago provincial system. For the same reason Catholics have steadily declined to accept, as suitable for Catholic children, the New South Wales system of pure secularism tempered by brief .stated periods of religious instruction — even though that instruction may (where it can "be given) be really Catholic for Catholic pupils. We willjiave no act or part in excluding God and religion and religious principles and- influences from any vital process — least of all from that of education. On tho contrary, we would widen the scope and influence of religion till it embraces the whole life of man. 3. On grounds of conscience which are well known, and - from which they can recede, Catholics cannot formally participate in the religious instruction, religious training, or religious worship of other creeds. . Hence the religious" education of Catholic children must be wholly

along Catholic lines. To ensure this, the proper authorities of the Church claim the right of control of the education of Catholic children in all matters pertaining to faith and morals. In all civil and secular matters (as will be explained more fully in the course of this article) they, of course, admit State control. The right of control in mattors of faith and .morals implies (a) the supervision of the text-books dealing with religion, and,(b) the. right of insisting tbat the faith and moral character of the teacher of Catholic children shall be satisfactory. The Catholic Church does not recognise in the civil authority any right or competency to teach religion to Catholic children. .Neither does it "recognise any such right or competency in non-Catholic teachers — well knowing, by reason and experience, that none can teach or train in a religious faith except those that know and love it. Apart from this knowledge and love, such teaching, if attempted, would be erroneous, unreal,, a mere mechanical drill, and tho acting of a part. Hence, too, Catholics cannot accept, for Catholic children, any non-Catholic school compromises or arrangements on religious matters that may be entered into by the adherents of other Catholics have ever desired, and cordially desire, to see ■ non-Catholic children in the public schools brought up in Biblical and religious knowledge. Such compromises as those referred to are conscientiously possible among the more or less allied creeds which accept as their rule of faith the reformed principle of the -Bible and the^'Bible only, interpreted according to the individual private judgment. Catholics, like Jews, have a different rule of- faith and practice., Catholics must, as a matter of religious teaching* and^ of/ 'con science, stand outside and apart from any such compromises, so far as the religious instruction and training of ~t£iir own' children are concerned. Subject to State control "in. civil and secular matters — as indicated and to be further" indicated — ■ Catholics desire Catholic schools and Catfiolic 1 teachers for Catholic children. The extent to which this ideal may be limited as a working compromise, and yet fairly meet tho Catholic demand, will be broadly indicated .later on. 4. Catholics would gladly co-operate in any jiisi&and reasonable scheme having for its object the instruction or training of non-Catholic children in the public Tsclfbols, during school hours, in Biblical and religious knowMflgo. But, whether as Catholics, or as citizens and taxpayers, we could not accept as just and reasonable any *'-such scheme running on the following lines : — (a) Any such nonCatholic scheme without a' conscience clause. (b) "Any scheme (as above) with a conscience clause making it legally compulsory for Catholic children to attend such Biblical reading or instruction, unless their parents or guardians enter formal protests, written or verbal, against it. The only conscience 'clause that would be deemed satisfactory for Catholic children would be one empowering the giving of Biblical or religiotis instruction, to those children whose parents or guardians by express word or act desire it. (c) Catholics could not accept as just and reasonable any non-Catholic scheme of Biblical reading and religious instruction as part of the State curriculum, if, as now, it would compel us to pay a double tax for education — namely, contributions for the Catholic education which Catholic children receive, and another (a Government impost) for a system of public instruction of which we could not in conscience avail ourselves. 5. Finally, Catholics will never accept, for Catholic children, any system of public instruction divorced from religion, such as that of Victoria (Act of 1872, section 12) and of the New Zealand "Act of 1877, which declares (section 8-1, sub-section 2) that ' the teaching shall be entirely of a secular character.' The grounds of the/Catholic objection to tho hard legalised secularism of these systems-have been indirectly indicated in the preceding paragraphs, and in fuller detail in the course of previous articles cf ■tho present,series. I ask the patient and thoughtful reader to bear well in mind that the position taken up ,by Catholics in regard to education is not. dictated by caprice,, or perversity or ohuekle-headeduess. It is purely a matter of religious belief and conscience. There is no more use in scolding us about it than in quarrelling with us about the color- of our hair or eyes. On other matters we can compromise. On those matters, connected with our stand on education, which depend upon religious -truths oi\ principles, we can never yield in one iota. 'There we are, and there we remain. And the earnest seeker of a way out of the religious difficulty may as well, frankly and in a reasonable ' and statesmanlike way, accept a position which he cannot hope to alter\ We ask that our conscientious inability to compromise beyond a certain point be treated with as much N consideration as the conscientious'- ability of many of our Protestant friends to carry compromise somewhat further. Only two further matters remain to be dealt with. One of these — the sectarian character of the secular system w ill occupy a few brief paragraphs; the other is a state-

ment of schemes or compromises which Catholics would, in the opinion of the present writer, accept as working solutions of the religious difficulty in education. The treatment of these subjects would, however, unduly prolong the present lengthy article. With the editor's courteous permission, I will hold over for another issue the balance of this article, which closes the present series.