SUNDAY SCHOOLS AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

Waiapu Church Gazette, Volume XXI, Issue 6, 1 December 1930, Page 4

SUNDAY SCHOOLS AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION

The Editor, The Waiapu Church Gazette, Sir, You have asked me to write' an article on the above subject. I hove put what I have to say m the form of a letter, m order that it may, I hope, provoke some discussion m your columns ; for, it seems to me, there is no matter more important to the welfare of the Church at the present time, and on which discussion may be more valuable. In order to get as exact information as possible, I applied to the Government Statistician, and am indebted,. to him for supplying m.c with the following facts. The non-Maori population of the Diocese is estimated at 120,780. The Church of England population is estimated at 46 per cent of that, giving 55,558. Of this, the per centage of school age, that is, 5 to 16, is 22.75. That gives us the number of children m the Diocese for whom our Church should be providing religious teaching. It works out at 12,639. A return presented to Synod this year gave the number of scholars on the rolls of our Sunday Shcools at 4,079. If we add to that number of Bible Class members — 830, we get the total number for whom apparently the Church is providing teaching, 4j909. It is however to be remembered that a number of these Bible Class members ar© Maoris, and quite a largr: proportion are over 16 years of age. Jt is probable that five hundred children of the Diocese are attending boarding schools where they get instruction m religion. It is possible however that some of these are included m the returns supplied to Synod, as members of the Sunday Schools or the .Bible Classes. There will be some children, too, who are taught at home. However, making all. the allowances that may be thought fair, we get the broad fact that not half of our children are getting instruction m religion, at any rate, not m our Sunday Schools or Bible Classes. Perhaps the statement will be made, that a large number of those who do not attend, cannot possibly do so by reason of distance from the nearest Sunday School. I doubt that this is an adequate reason for the deficiency. I am sure that the evil is general. But supposing that that is the reason why they are not on the roll of any Sunday School, the question at once arises as to what the Church is doing about it. If half th'e children of the Dominion were not catered for by the State Schools, would the Education Depart-

ment be content to let the matter slide? Surely it should be a prime duty of the Church authorities to help the parents of such children. The greater the number of these m the Diocese, the more urgent was the. need for this part of the work to have been organised years ago. Let me at once acknowledge that some years ago, when Archdeacon Butterfield was editor of the Church Gazette, he inserted, each month,, lessons for back-block children; but they were discontinued because their value did not seem to be appreciated. In any case those lessons could have reached only a very small per centage indeed of those who needed them. . It would be very interesting to know how many used them. To return to our numbers. It must be pointed out that the return presented to Synod is that of the number of children on the rolls. A number of these attend very badly, and some are . returned as attending when they have made very few attendances during the year. I believe that m only a few Schools would the average attendance be over 60 per cent of the roll number. But, taking our roll number as 5,000, and allowing a per centage of 70, we get an estimated number under instruction each Sunday as 3,500. I am sure that this is a very liberal estimate. Accepting it however, we get th'e second broad fact that not one child m three belonging to our Church m our Diocese is attending Sunday School on any average Sunday. It is right here, I think, to point out that a very probable effect at first of the introduction of Bible instruction into the day schools, if the agitation for that reform should be successful, will be to reduce this number still further. Some of us even now know from experience that the giving of half-an-hour's instruction under the Nelson System is used as an excuse by parents for not sending children to Sunday School. They say that they do not need it as they get it m the Day School. I need hardly take up your space m pointing out how that, despite the selfsacrificing efforts of our Sunday School teachers, owing to the unsuitable conditioms under wihich they work lack of adequate equipment, want of proper training,! of proper system, and of helps, their work is nothing like as efficient as it might and should be. Let me get on to what seerris to me to be the real. problem. It is now sixty years since Bible Instruction was dropped out of our State School curriculum. We have reached the third generation of people who have riot had teaching m that way. It is - at present idle to talk about the parents instructing the

children m religion. In very many cases :the parents are as ignorant as their children. I am of the opinion that the position m the main can only he altered by the education of the. parents. That may not seem, a very hopeful proposal. Most of them do not want to be instructed. Yet perhaps if the matter is introduced m the right way, something may be done. Th> necessity for adult religious education is strongly stressed m the report of the Lambeth Conference. '-But .first we would urge that far greater insistande should be laid upon mental discipline and exercise as one of the duties of the Christian life. Too often religious instruction is regarded as completed by the preparation required before Confirmation. Every new communicant should recognise that Confirmation is a new beginning, and that spitirual progress will normally depend upon a growing intellectual apprehension of Christian truth. Study and discussion circles for adolescents and adults should be part of the normal equipment of every parish. We welcome many indications that such activities are being encouraged and assisted both m Great Britain and the British Dominions and m the Unfed States, by Dioctesan and Cathedral authorities and by such central organisations as the Church Tutorial Classes Association." (p. 79). And again, "Inasmuch as nothing can take the place of home influence, it is vital that parents should have an opportunity of learning how to teach the Christian faith and life to their children. "We welcome the efforts that are now being made to provide such opportunities through various schemes for the religious education of the adult.' (p. 196). How a-ny such work is to be done m a scattered diocese like, ours will demand the keenest thought) expert knowledge, efficient organisation, and considerable finance, and perhaps, most of all, a persistence that is untiring. For it will be years before its results begin to be seen. If I might presume to suggest some lines on which action might be taken — First, I would endeavour to get the ideal into tlite older children that they must keep on learning, and that the Bible Classes are the natural organisations with which they should link up at Confirmation. I should like to see adult Bible Classes formed m every parish, and that not only for the instruction of adults, but also for the purpose of encouraging the yOung people to continue as Bible Class members until they join some adult organisation for study. Then, it seems essential

that young parents should get, some;' special help as to how they may bring up their young children until they -are.. of school age, and they should get ad-y vice as to sending ■ them to Sunday School, and reasons why they shoukkdo so. I believe that Professor Hunter said the other day m Wellington/ that seventy-five per cent of the troubles of this Dominion were clue to the want of proper home training m early years. It should surely be possible to put into the hands of parents when they bring., a child to Baptism a handbook -that ; they would find helpful. The. Plunkett : Society do that with regard to the' care of the child's body, could we not do it for his soul? And m doing so, you are helping to save the parents-. They will be . susceptible, and never •more so than at- such a time, • to the influences of a religion that is interested m their child. It is impossible to absolve t"he parents from responsibility m the matter of the religious'education of the child. They must not come to look on the. Sunday School as a substitute for, but as an assistant to their special work. But under the conditions m which we live they must have help. There should be some system for helping those interested m the establishment of Sunday Schools where there are none at present. The proposed itinerant Diocesan Organiser might do much that way. But a system of correspondence teaching is absolutely necessary for children m out-of-the-way places where there are no Sunday Schools. Some use might perhaps be made of the Press. We do not use it at all as it should and might be used," at least not m these parts. As was suggested m Synod, by one of our Maori brethren, some use might also be made of wireless. But it is always the personal influence of the Vicar, the Sunday School Superintendent, and the Bible Class leader that will count most with the young people. Yet while this is so, they too need help m the supply of suitable literature, 'especially ftbr putting into the hands of parents, and, wherever possible, they want help m the shape of some organisation for linking up the adults for the study of religion. I feel that we are at a critical time. If we boldly set ourselves to a task which is bristling with difficulties, we may surely look for the help of the Holy Spirit, and be enabled to do what is otherwise impossible. On the other hand, if we let things . drift as they are doing, we seal our doom. The Church cannot live unless it takes care for the nurture of its children, for; thtey are the Church of the future. If know-

ledge grows from inpre . to lfrore, igiiorance does so . too, and at a: still faster ; rate. ; The one • harvest, "can oilly;: come ■> r at the cost of infinite, .trouble" and pain ; r . the other comes easily and inevitably by neglect, • :. ' '/ • ■•."-••.'-' '■..'% ■'■'.'•■'■■"' 1 am,. Sir, •-" , „-..- ■„-• _'v ...'• ■'.'■■' Yours- "etc.,. - „,.-.' ..: :l-K :: r'-'- ] -rY> r -- : M .SPEIGHT,