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PAGE TWO—Section Two
THE BULLETIN
Saturday, August 20, 1960
NO TRUE EDUCATION WITHOUT GOD
Divine Commission to Teach
Given to Church by Founder
(Continued, From Page One )
sire, prompted by desperation, to find the truth, the
whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
If we study the early history of the Church, we
shall find that as soon as she was granted her liberty
under the Caesars and emerged from the catacombs,
she interested herself in the work of general education.
Cathedral and monastery schools grew up on all sides.
The fall of Rome and the barbarian invasion blotted
out the light of learning, and introduced the beginning
of the Dark Ages.
As soon as the Christian Church had tamed the
wild extravagancies of the barbarian invaders from
the north and from the east, she systematically es
tablished her institutions of higher learning. There is
no need for us to remind the reader of the history
of the great universities of Europe. Practically every
university whose name is held in honor traces its origin
and foundation to a Pontifical charter: Oxford, Cam
bridge, St. Andrew’s, Bologna, Paris, Salamanca, and
others.
Facets of Indivisible Truth
The Church realizes that all science and all knowl
edge are merely different facets of one and the same
indivisible truth. Truth has many aspects but it cannot
be treated in fragmentary fashion. It has its own in
tegrity; if it is wounded in one of its members, the
whole organism suffers. If the wound should happen
to be in the head—that is, in the field of philosophy or
theology—then the whole body of truth is disturbed.
To illustrate: How can there be any sound and
rational social order until we know the nature, origin,
and destiny of man, who is the unit of society? How can
we know what is right or wrong for man, whether in
dividually or socially considered, until we know
whether God exists, whether Christ is God, whether
man has a spiritual nature with an eternal destiny or
whether he is merely part of the natural universe
without a destiny beyond the grave.
All these truths are part of a universal whole.
And because the Church realizes this, she considers
it to be a necessary part of her mission to establish
schools and universities wherein she can exercise
her universal magisterium.
Three Sources of Knowledge
In the last analysis, there are only three sources
of knowledge: The one is human authority, represent
ing a crystallized experience of past ages; the second
is personal observation, sifted by the human mind
through analysis and synthesis; and the third, the revel
ation of God, embodying the truths of divine faith
which transcend human experiences and human reason.
From Greece and Rome extends the classical ex
perience which represents the finest achievements of
human reason. From Jerusalem and Christian Rome
extends that divine revelation which, together with the
classical tradition, constitutes the foundation of our
highest culture and civilization.
St. Thomas Aquinas brought together these two
streams of knowledge and worked them into a com
prehensive whole. Very appropriately, therefore, he
has been declared officially by the Church as the
heavenly patron not only of theological seminaries
but of all Catholic institutions of higher education.
He is the “Angelic Doctor,” who, with something akin
to the intuition of the angels, has penetrated the most
profound mysteries of our faith and has united in a
complete synthesis the knowledge derived from ob
servation and the deductions of right reason.
The universal cry of the world today is for peace,
order, and stability. There can be no peace, no order,
no stability until there is an acceptance once more
of those principles on which our civilization was es
tablished and on which the whole structure of peace
and tranquillity must rest.
Two Pervading Errors
The two pervading errors in our educational
system today, errors which vitiate to a great extent
otherwise considerable achievements, are secular
ism and false liberty.
Secularism is the attitude and spirit which denies
a place to supernatural truth within the realm of human
knowledge. Secularism, or the rejection of revealed
truth, is in the background of the whole perverse
ideology which dominates Russia and a large part
of the world today. It is an ever-present danger in this
country and may have serious consequences unless
the Christian heritage of our people is reclaimed be
fore it is too late.
If those who are to be the intellectual leaders of
mankind are taught that they are mere creatures of
earth with no eternal destiny, no spiritual nature, no
responsibility to God, sooner or later these errors will
filter through to the masses and cause them to lead
lives marked by class hatred, envy, contention, and
revolution.
The second error is the false liberty speciously
presented as academic freedom. Behind this false
facade of freedom lurk anarchy and disorder. Truth
is imperious in its demands. It claims absolute loyalty
from every human mind. No one is intellectually free
to deny truth or to subscribe to falsehood. Truth, by
its very nature, carries authority and is dogmatic within
its own domain.
When Christ taught in Galilee, the one thing that
impressed His hearers was His calm profession of the
truth and His affirmation of clear-cut dogmas. The
people were in admiration of His doctrine, because
they said “this Man speaks with authority.” So, too,
must any upright teacher speak, where truth and not
mere opinion is concerned.
Chesterton said the last word on the contro
versy concerning dogmatic education when he enun
ciated the truism: “A teacher who is not dogmatic,
is a teacher who does not teach.”
Would Be Death to Education
When liberty is erected into an end, we are in
sight of the death, first, of education; and, second, of
the society which has surrendered itself to this grave
folly; and, last but not least, of liberty itself. That an
unqualified worship of liberty will mean the death of
education is obvious, for if the teacher is forbidden
in the name of liberty to espouse one view or way of
life rather than another, then it is clear that the
teacher does not teach. Like Othello, his “occupation’s
gone.”
There may be in some court a case for such liberty,
but there is certainly no cause for calling it a system of
education. It is, to quote Chesterton again, no more a
system of education than “sleeping under a hedge is
a new form of architecture.”
Any pretendedly non-dogmatic system of educa
tion survives only because, in fact, it is highly dog
matic, and, despite all pretense of impartiality, does
impose a definite philosophy of life, even though that
philosophy of life be mere agnosticism.
Loss of belief in God has over the ages most
logically led to the loss of belief in man. The Swin-
burnian halfway house of “Glory to man in the high
est; for man is the master of things,” was too ob
viously hollow to satisfy man for any length of time.
It has been the happiness and the glory of Europe
that the dogmas of her educational system have been
those of the Christian religion.
Some years before Hitler came to power, Christo
pher Dawson wrote in his Progress and Religion: “It
seems as though a new society is arising which will
acknowledge no hierarchy of values, no intellectual
authority, and no social or religious tradition, but
which will live for the moment in a chaos of pure
sensation. . . It is obvious that a civilization of this
kind holds no promise for the future save that of
social disintegration.”
It is not too late to save ourselves by putting the
clock back. In education, at any rate, the policy for
the future must be one of reaction. And the Church
must lead the way, for she has a divine commission
to teach the truth to men of all generations.
Patron of Schools
St. Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274) achieved a masterful
synthesis of philosophy and revelation in his “Sununa
Theologica,” the fullest exposition of theological
teaching ever given to the world. In 1880 he was de
clared by Leo XIII the patron of all universities, col
leges, and schools. St. Thomas ever declared that he
learned more at the foot of the crucifix than from
books.
DECLARATION OF FAITH
Why Support System
Of Separate Schools?
By Archbishop Karl J. Alter
I T MAY SEEM STRANGE to some of our fellow
citizens that we Catholics should voluntarily
accept the burden of supporting a separate
school system, particularly when adequate facili
ties are available in the public schools.
Let us assure all those who think along these lines
that we as Catholics do not enjoy this unique position.
We should much prefer to share the benefits of the
tax-supported schools if it were not that deep convic
tions on our part make it necessary to follow an inde
pendent course. A declaration of faith, therefore, in
the principles which underlie our educational program,
seems in order.
Education of Whole Person
We believe in an educational program that de
velops every aspect and faculty of the human person—
body, mind, and heart. This means a balanced pro
gram which fits a person for his duties to God, to
his fellow man, and to himself.
From our very beginnings we have held to the
firm conviction that no form of knowledge and no hu
man experience should be withheld from our children
or eliminated from the educational process. Education
should take into account all knowledge without dis
crimination. The higher the knowledge, the more ur
gent its claim on our recognition; the more useful it
is in daily life, the more imperative is its inclusion
in an educational program.
To us it is unthinkable that an educational pro
gram can be complete which neglects an essential
part of the human personality or a basic area of
human knowledge and experience. To us religion
is a vital part of education just as is history or lit
erature or social relations. Indeed it is more vitally
a part of education than any or all of these others
because its values are still valid in a life beyond
the grave.
We believe that the first right and duty of pro
viding an education for children rests with the parents
and therefore we are opposed to any State monopoly
or complete nationalization of the educational system
just as much as we are opposed to the nationalization
of business and industry.
We believe that the State has the right and duty
to set minimum standards of education for citizenship;
but we believe also that the State is bound to assist
parents to fulfill their duties by the use of public
subsidy without violating religious freedom or engag
ing in discriminatory class legislation.
Equal Rights lor All
We believe in equal rights and full religious free
dom for all citizens irrespective of color, race, and
creed; we desire to see all children enjoy the best
educational facilities without discrimination. We hold
that in the field of education this fundamental require
ment of freedom and this postulate of the democratic
process are at present being challenged by a prejudice
which carries over from the past, and by a failure to
understand the danger to liberty and democracy in
herent in such attitudes.
We believe in the democratic freedom of all
citizens to select that type of education which meets
their needs without any legal discrimination lodged
against them because they so exercise their consti
tutional freedom of choice.
We believe in a program of free and universal
education, including elementary and high school, for
all who are qualified to profit by it. We believe in a
system of public-loan scholarships for college and pro
fessional training similar to the GI program whereby
each student can select his own school.
We hold firmly that the purpose of education is
not merely to prepare men for life here but for the
life hereafter. We believe that a complete system of
education has to do with the will as well as the mind,
its purpose being not merely to make men “smart” but
to make them good.
We are in complete agreement with the philosophy
of the Founding Fathers of this country who spoke
their mind to us in the words of Washington: “Of ali
the dispositions and habits which lead to political
prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable sup
ports. The mere politician, equally with the pious
man, ought to respect and cherish them. And let us
with caution indulge the supposition that morality can
be maintained without religion. Whatever may be
conceded to the influence of refined education on
minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience
both forbid us to expect that national morality can
prevail in exclusion of religious principle.”
'Mind of Archbishop 7
Articles by Archbishop Karl J. Alter in this issue
are taken from a forthcoming volume, “The Mind of
an Archbishop,” subtitled “A Study of Man’s Essential
Relationship to God, Church, Country, and Fellow
Man,” from the writings of the Most Rev. Karl J. Alter.
Edited by the Rev. Maurice E. Reardon, the book will
be published in September by the St. Anthony Guild,
Paterson, N.J. (Price $6, 400 pages, pre-publication
orders accepted.)