Religious instruction

“ Men of all creeds and of none agree, that religious instruction ought to be given, to all the children and youth of the land, but the task of attempting it is a tremendous one, and the best manner of doing it is not clear to all. ”

“ Religious instruction must carry across to life and conduct—Hence necessity of finding practical outlet in expression for feelings, ideals, emotions and attitudes resulting from instruction—The setting up of certain religious habits—Expression in connection with the life of the church—Expression in the home life—Expression in the community and public school life—Expression in worship and the devotional life—Problems for discussion. ”

“ I venture to assert that the only reasonable difference of opinion possible among candid and just men is as to the best way of inculcating religion in the young and the extent to which religious instruction is essential as a part of the complete education of children. ”

“ In other words, we are a religious people. And yet, notwithstanding this fact, so far as thoroughgoing, systematic religious education is concerned, when compared with the time and efforts devoted to education along other lines, and its quality, it suffers painfully. In nearly all of the states, five days a week, of at least four or five hours each, are given to what we call secular education, as against one day per week, of one hour each, to religious instruction and worship. ”

“ It follows from this that religious instruction must call for and use the same activities of mind that are called for in other phases of education. Not only must the feelings be reached and the emotions stirred, but the child must be taught to think in his religion. Not only must trust and faith be grounded, but these must be made intelligent. ”

“ That in the Roman Catholic Church the literary and religious instruction of youth are universally combined, and that no system of education which separates them can be acceptable to the members of her communion; that the religious instruction of youth in Catholic schools is always conveyed by means of catachetical instruction, daily prayer, and the reading of religious books, wherein the Gospel morality is explained and inculcated ”

“ Having no regular religious instruction, seldom hearing the voice of a living teacher, with scarce a Bible to be found within their gloomy houses, they were but little in advance of the heathen as to religious knowledge, and far too near allied to them in many of their vicious habits. ”

“ Religious Education.—A third function of the church is religious education. This function of education in religion belongs theoretically to the church, in common with the home and the school, but the tendency has been to turn the religious education of children over to the school of the church. The minister, priest, or rabbi is the chief teacher of faith and duty, but in the Sunday-school the laity also has found instruction of the young people to be one of its functions. ”

“ One great purpose, then, in religious instruction is to attach the stimulus and appeal of religion to the common round of daily life and experience of the child. As Christ came that we might have life, not a future life alone, but a full, happy, and worthy life in the present as well, so we come to the child as a teacher to help him in his life here and now. ”

“ The best way, in fact the only way, to guard against this danger, especially with the young, is to show, by your manner of speaking and acting on this subject, at all times, that you regard a truly religious life, as the only evidence of piety;—and that consequently, however much interest your pupils may apparently take in religious instruction, they cannot know, and you cannot know, whether Christian principle reigns within them, in any other way than by following them through life and observing how, and with what spirit, the various duties of it are performed. ”

“ In the first place, the facts are not exactly as stated by those making the objection. Though little direct religious instruction may be given in the common school, there is usually a large amount of religious influence. ”

“ It is not sufficient to say, that education is to be conducted on religious principles, for on the subject of religion there exists, in this day, a most unfortunate and mischievous variety of opinions, which would be much diminished if the Holy Scriptures were made the real, as they are the professed, groundwork of every system of Christian instruction. ”

“ What means have we of learning the Christian doctrine? A. We have many means of learning the Christian doctrine: In youth we have Catechism and special instructions suited to our age; later we have sermons, missions, retreats, religious sodalities and societies through which we may learn. At all times, we have books of instruction, and, above all, the priests of the Church, ever ready to teach us. God will not excuse our ignorance if we neglect to learn our religion when He has given us the means. ”

“ For it is in these schools, above all, that the children of the people ought to be carefully taught from their tender years the mysteries and precepts of our holy religion, and to be trained with diligence to piety, good morals, religion and civilization. In such schools religious teaching ought to have so leading a place in all that concerns education and instruction, that whatever else the children may [Pg 312] learn should appear subsidiary to it. ”

“ Such a view would limit religious education in the home to the formal teaching of the Bible and religious dogma by parents. The memorizing of scriptural passages and of the different catechisms once constituted a regular duty in almost all well-ordered homes. Today it is rarely attempted. Does that mean that religious education has ceased in the home?
But education means much more than instruction. Education is the whole process, of which instruction is only a part. ”

“ In the earlier stages of instruction, the catechetical method may be resorted to with success, your subjects being of the simplest kind; as you advance and your people acquire habits of attention and reflection and improve in knowledge, your subjects may be more elevated. "5th. The matter of preaching, at least for no very inconsiderable a time, may be chiefly, narratives, biographies, striking works of God, miracles, parables. Didactic discourses, at least at first, are far from being interesting to them. Vary the exercises of worship by singing, and sing standing. ”

“ They have altered methods of Biblical education in our Sunday Schools, have shown us helpful and harmful ways of presenting religious appeals, and have given us scientific standards to test the value of the materials employed in public worship. ”

“ In more recent times Ellen Key remarks in a suggestive chapter on "Religions Education" in her Century of the Child: "Nothing better shows how deeply rooted religion is in human nature than the fact that 'religious education' has not been able to tear it out." ”

“ He referred, first, to the false association which those words of world-wide meaning, ‘religious education,’ are almost sure to induce, when restricted, in a narrow, inadequate sense, to the teaching of the schoolmaster; and next, to the divine commission of the minister of the gospel. ‘Perverted as human nature is,’ he remarked, ‘there are cases in which, by appealing to its sentiments and affections, we may derive a very nice evidence respecting the divine origin of certain institutions and injunctions. ”

“ An education, that has filled his mind with somewhat distorted meanings, for the terms, religious faith, soul, sin, salvation, religion, total depravity and many others of a similar import, which theology has applied to man's spiritual welfare. ”

“ What truths will even now, while he is still a child, awaken his spiritual appreciation and touch the springs of his emotional response to the heavenly Father? What religious concepts, once developed, will lead the youth into a rich fullness of personal experience and develop in him the will and capacity to serve others? What religious knowledge will finally make most certain a life of loyalty to the church and the great cause for which it stands?" When we can answer these questions we shall then be able to say what knowledge is of most worth in the religious training of our children. ”

“ And, after all, if we concede to the State power and wisdom to single out 'duly constituted religious' bodies as exclusive alternatives for compulsory secular instruction, it would be logical to also uphold the power and wisdom to choose the true faith among those 'duly constituted.' We start down a rough road when we begin to mix compulsory public education with compulsory godliness. ”

“ By whose authority do some religious teachers now lead the suffering through such a round-about, intricate, or arid path of things to be done and doctrines to be accepted before bringing them to Christ? ”

“ If the boy be disciplined in religion with environments good, associations good, and with love as his teacher till he is come of age, to the age of reason, the point of the early training will be invariably a moral religious life. ”

“ In the Christian schools, while the carefully-selected American teachers insure good schools and good teaching of the ordinary branches, there is a place for moral education, for simple religious exercises and for Bible study. ”

“ Religion, then, forms the spirit and essence of all true education. As leaven must be diffused throughout the entire mass in order to produce its effects, so religion must be thoroughly diffused throughout the child's entire education, in order to be solid and effective. Not a moment of the hours of school should be left without religious influence. It is the constant breathing of the air that preserves our bodily life, and it is the constant dwelling in a religious atmosphere that preserves the life of the youthful soul. Here are laid the primitive principles of future character and conduct. ”

“ For a goodly number of intelligent minds—agnostics and independents in their theological views—it has already to a large extent supplanted the Church as an agency for moral, and in a qualified and unconventional sense, of religious education. ”

“ But here we have the breadth of minds so wide in the sweep of their intelligence, so profound in their insight, that we are almost startled with the perception that, pictured on these walls, we have indeed a true measure of the thoughts of God. Let us glance for a moment at our nineteenth century conception of education. In the first place, we divide education into religious and secular. The more devout among us insist upon religious education as well as secular. ”

“ The aim of religious education is to fit the child for complete Christian living, to make him not simply a religious individual but a useful member of society, intelligently devoted to the highest welfare of his fellows and of mankind. ”

“ Such education involves the development of the child’s religious nature, and the diligent use of those means by which it may become an adopted child of God.
Education should be suited to the wants and the destination of the child. Religion is its first want,—the one thing needful, the chief concern; and should, therefore, be the first object of attention in home-training. The fear and love of God should be the first lesson taught. ”

“ Thousands of children are now regularly receiving instruction in our holy religion, and the enlightenment which comes from mental training. [9] Already one high-school has furnished a score and more of catechists and teachers; has produced three native young men, fit candidates for holy orders in the Church, who are preaching the Gospel to their own kith and kin in heathen darkness. ”

“ Christian teaching is distinguished from other religious teaching by its justice to women, its tender reverence for childhood, and by the laying down of that great corner-stone, Inward Holiness, as the indispensable foundation of true life. ”

“ To allow a child to rattle off a prayer, or say it inattentively, flippantly, or to show off, or to permit him to treat any sacred place, objects, or rites flippantly, is to foster irreverence and weaken the religious sense. Service to God, to an ideal, to people, as an integral part of religion, is an association that is [Pg 221] not instinctive, but one that the child needs to be taught by example, precept, and training. ”

“ Religion must first approach the child in the form of life, and afterward in the form of instruction. Let religion be the atmosphere by which the child is surrounded, the air which it breathes. The whole spirit of the home, its order, its practice—that world in which the child finds himself so soon as he knows himself—this it is which must make religion appear to him a thing natural and self-evident. ”

“ It is safe to say, and this without reservation, the most fundamental problem in England and America to-day is the problem of religious education, because this lies at the roots of all else—political, social, and theological. ”

“ Education must be founded upon knowledge, not upon faith; and religion itself should be taught in the public schools only as religious history and as an objective or scientific exposition of the different religious systems prevailing among mankind. Any one who, after such an education, still experiences the need of a definite law or rule of faith may then attach himself to any religious sect that may seem good to him, but cannot claim that the community should bear the cost of this special fancy! ”

“ While the logical and the chronological method of organization still holds a place in many of the public school texts, the psychological point of view, which considers the needs of the child first, is characteristic of all the better schoolbooks of the present. Just because religion is more difficult to teach than grammar or history or arithmetic, we should plan with all the insight and skill at our command to prepare the religious material for our children so that its arrangement will not suffer by comparison with day-school material. ”