The Largest "Church" in America
by Kathy Brown on June 13th, 2009 | 1 comment
The Friday, June 12 Wall Street Journal article "Why Pay for Religious Schools When Charters Are Free" (by Erica Schacter Schwartz) discusses the pros and cons of statist charter schools. One particular phrase in the text is worth some deeper analysis. It is a quote from Rev. Kieran Harrington, the vicar of communications a the Brooklyn diocese: "A public school cannot be involved in the formation of the soul."
Now, is that true? Is that possible? Children attend public school for the majority of their waking hours, from at least age five to possibly age twenty-one, and there is no character formation? There is no instruction from curriculum, peers, teachers or administration on what is right and wrong? There is no abstraction from history, science, math, social studies, health, or literature about truth, on how to make decisions, what to do about evil (if evil has been determined to exist), or what the purpose of getting an education is at all? Really? If this is correct, that tax supported education delivers nothing but "facts" to young people, that would be excellent! However, this is not only impossible, but absolutely not what goes on when little Johnny and Jilly go off on the school bus.
On the contrary, American public government schools are tutoring children with a distinct political, ethical and spiritual viewpoint. Until we "get" that, we will not discover what has really gone wrong. With the omission of God as the underpinning of truth, a move made by a series of court decisions, classrooms have adopted a religion. It is Secular Humanism, and it has deceptively passed as "neutral." Its presuppositions stand in sharp contrast to those of any God-believing institution. It would benefit us all to study the "chart" (Foundational Presupposition Chart) and see what that one "small" idea ,that God does not exist, leads to: an entire way of thinking and living that, indeed, does involve the formation of a soul.