Something is wrong. Commitment is a thing of the past. Love that is longsuffering has been replaced by divorce on demand. Charity is dead. We have ceased to instill our children with virtues and then we are shocked that they grow up to be reprobates. Materialism and hedonism are the philosophies of the masses because their education has not empowered them to define either. Our modern world has left us dissatisfied and disillusioned. We search for something lost. Classicism is on the ascendancy.

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

In Defense of Christian Education

"Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism, and every American school is a school of humanism. What can a theistic Sunday school's meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?" -- Charles F. Potter, Humanism: A New Religion

As Christian parents, we have erred. It was Paul who charged godly fathers to "bring [their children] up in the training and admonition of the Lord." It is significant to note the particular Greek word used by Paul and translated as "training" in this verse is παιδεία (paideia), which bears with it the weight of "teaching, and education."  It also extends beyond formal education to include "culture, learning, accomplishments"; that is to say, παιδεία is holistic education or training, which includes formal education.[1] This verse might be more accurately translated as "fathers,... bring [your children] up in the education and admonition of the Lord." Notice also that the Apostle connects this holistic training with spiritual connotations: the very context of education in the Apostle's eyes is necessarily spiritual, παιδεία κυρίου, or "the education of the Lord." The Christian student must not only understand the truths necessary for salvation by grace through faith, but they must also be equipped to accurately navigate the ethical principles and theological complexities of their faith.

Let us examine momentarily if the modern government school system meets Paul's mandate to provide "an education of the Lord" for our children (the question as to whether or not it should falls well beyond the scope of this discussion; we consider for now only whether or not it actually does.) Due in no small part to the rise of the so-called "Separation of Church and State" doctrine and the 1963 Supreme Court decision Abington v. Schempp, modern public education in America has become strictly secular. Religious texts, namely the Hebrew Old Testament and the Christian New Testament, are no longer part of the core curriculum, even as primary texts. This is despite the fact that, as I have shown elsewhere, the Supreme Court in Abington v. Schempp declared that no education would be complete without studying the Bible as a literary and historical text. At best the government schools, under the guise of pure secularism, are negligent and apathetic towards religious thought; at worst, individual educators can be openly hostile to Christians, even declaring a Christian education to be "damn wrong."

We should briefly note that this has not always been the case. Early American education was built upon a biblical foundation. The two greatest texts of American education were the New England Primer and the McGuffey Reader. The Primer was the first American textbook and was used in the colonies in the late 18th century. Its lessons were inspired almost entirely from the Bible; for example, it used Biblical stories in this set of alphabet rhymes. The McGuffey Readers were used by public schools for over 100 years - from 1836 to the late 1950's - as part of the core primary school curriculum. It is estimated to have sold 120 million copies over that 100 year span. A sample of lessons from the Readers include The Goodness of God, Gospel Invitation, Ode from the 19th Psalm, and On Prayer. Corporate prayer and daily Bible devotionals were part of the regular school curriculum until the 1960's. The public system has changed dramatically over the last fifty years, and as Christians we should agree that it has not been for the better. We have played the part of the Trojans and accepted the gift of a free education without suspecting the Greeks who gave it, heedless of the warnings of Laocoön. In the face of a system that is often antithetical and hostile to our worldview, it is time we considered other options.

There are of course additional arguments for a Christian education that serve to supplement Paul's mandate. For one, consider the end goal—the primary objective—of education. Many parents and educators would argue that the end goal of education is to prepare the student for the workforce, to give them the requisite math and science education along with some fundamental reading and communication skills to become good inventors, scientists, engineers, and accountants. This goal as the primary end of education is unsatisfactory in the context of Paul's mandate. Consider Jesus' response when asked which commandments were paramount: the greatest commandment for the believer is not to become good engineers and accountants, but it is to love God and love your neighbor, what we might consider the act of becoming a "good person." Jesus—and all the Law and Prophets— were most concerned with ethical considerations, how to act towards your neighbors, and not professional ones. It would seem appropriate as Christian parents we demand that our educational system should serve this same goal.

Consider also: if our education processes can successfully produce a good person—defined above as a person who loves God and loves his or her neighbor—it will often deliver a good engineer as a product; that is, a good person will necessarily be better at almost whatever profession they pursue. The student whose education has trained him or her to love God will want to be a good ambassador for God, which entails being a good employee, manager, or business owner. The student whose education has trained him to love his neighbor will be civically minded, fair, and honest. He or she will want to be a good physician, engineer, or accountant in order to best serve his or her neighbors. A good person who is trained to love his or her family will be a good spouse and parent, and as such will propagate goodness in others. A student who is trained only to be a good accountant delivers none of these things. It could be the difference between raising Tim Tebow or Bernie Madoff.

Another reason that Christian parents should concern themselves with Christian education is the utility of a solid biblical foundation in the life of the believer. As adults, consider for a moment how often you reference your high school trigonometry or biology textbook. Now, compare that with how often you reference the Bible. In the very least you hear a sermon on Sunday with numerous references to specific verses in the Bible; at most you read the Bible daily. Regardless, the number of times you reference any given high school text book pales in comparison to the number of times you use the Bible as an adult. To put it another way, I recently polled the readers of this blog asking them to weigh in on the literary source they looked to most often for wisdom, comfort, and inspiration: the Bible got 90% of the votes from a list with 9 other options. Yet, we send our children to schools to get an education with no biblical foundation whatsoever, where they spend hours absorbing information that they neither love nor will find useful in their lifetime.

As the Psalmist was wont to say, selah. Pause, and reflect on that. As Christian parents, we have a biblical mandate to ensure that our children our educated in the things of God. For mostly practical purposes, we have neglected this God-given responsibility, instead choosing to give our children over to a largely hostile government system to be educated. Our best hope seems to be that the 45 minutes of Christian influence our children may get in Sunday school and our own best efforts in the home can counter the twelve years of 5 days a week of secular humanism that they get in the government school. Consider the harrowing words of the humanist Charles Potter: "What can a theistic Sunday school's meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?"

Potter seems to have been right. Two generations of Christian students trained almost exclusively in the secular humanism of the government school system have had dire consequences. Biblical literacy within the Christian community is not what it could be. The proud history of Western Civilization is falling into disrepute and darkness while the government schools emphasizes social histories like LGBT history. We as Christians are largely ignorant of our own intellectual heritage. Too few of us can articulate the intellectual contributions of Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, Descartes, Kant, et al. The sum total of our failings leaves us as a community largely unequipped to defend our faith against the deluge of attacks leveled at it. There are too few voices with the platform who can speak with authority and erudition against drivel like Gervais' straw man attack. Atheists and secularists claim reason and science as their own, and Christians are portrayed as superstitious and irrational akratics stuck in the illusory "Dark Ages" - itself a construct of secularist polemics. The situation elicits the wise words of Sayers:

"For we let our young men and women go out unarmed, in a day when armor was never so necessary. By teaching them all to read, we have left them at the mercy of the printed word. By the invention of the film and the radio, we have made certain that no aversion to reading shall secure them from the incessant battery of words, words, words. They do not know what the words mean; they do not know how to ward them off or blunt their edge or fling them back; they are a prey to words in their emotions instead of being the masters of them in their intellects."

The question then becomes, why do we continue to subject our children to a system that not only neglects to serve us in delivering educational opportunities for our children, but is often openly hostile to our worldview? Why blindly hope for the best instead of giving our children the superior chances at growing up to be the godly men and women that we believe they can be, able to answer the challenges of the secularists with authority and erudition? The answers to those questions are many and diverse. It is often merely a question of economics: our children can go across the street to the secular government school for free, while we would have to pay out of pocket to send our kids to a private school of our choosing. For many this is a matter of necessity—they simply cannot afford the private school tuition. But where we can afford it, do not our kids warrant it? Where parents cannot afford it, we as the Christian community must work double time to ensure quality Christian schools exist and scholarship programs are in place to allow students to attend them.


[1] Liddell & Scott, An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, p. 584.

7 comments:

  1. One weakness of the article may be that it leans towards setting up a false dichotomy between the two choices of sending your child to a private Christian school (good) and, well, any other secular school (bad) without mentioning that a Christian parent has already been thoroughly equipped (2 Tim. 3:16-17) to instruct their children in the ways of the Lord. I have contended with you on this point before and you conceded that Christian education is, “not a panacea for all that ails our society. In an ideal world, the ‘instruction of the soul’ wouldn't fall solely on educational institutions.” You have further explained that Christian education works best in conjunction with involved parents. The article is missing this crucial point. Moreover, your argument of, “Our best hope seems to be that the 45 minutes of Christian influence our children may get in Sunday school and our own best efforts in the home can counter the twelve years of 5 days a week of secular humanism that they get in the government school.” almost completely displaces the parent’s relationship with their child. “Best hope!?” I submit that a Christian parent demonstrating the love of Christ in their everyday life bears more weight than the world’s most sublime teaching and crushes the scale. We would agree that many Christian parents have woefully abdicated their God-given role here but parents must not be lead to believe that this responsibility first falls on their child’s educational system or that they alone are not up to the task.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Those are mostly fair points, Matt. In my defense I would say the following:

    Let me state unequivocally: it is the responsibility of the parent to ensure that their children receive what Paul called the παιδεία κυρίου, or the "education of the Lord." Everything begins and ends at home. Even the most skilled Christian educator's best efforts will most likely lead to naught without the leadership of Mom and Dad at home. It is the job of the parents to ensure that their kids receive a biblical and spiritual education. My point in the essay is simply this: why are Christian parents so quick to send their kids to a school system that works in opposition to that goal as opposed to a system that works in league with it? A few things are at work here: first, the Christian community, in Idaho in particular, has been slow to respond to the radical changes in public education that took place in the 1960's by providing Christian parents with a viable Christian system of education (an error that I think is rapidly being remedied as schools like the Ambrose School prosper); second, the Christian community in all states has done a poor job of advocating loudly for a school choice program that meets their needs (why is it that secularists demand boldly and firmly that their kids not be subjected to religious education, while Christians quietly concede their kids to a secular education? This attitude disturbs me); and lastly, as Amanda pointed out, a secular education is not some happy medium between Christian education and a third opposing option: secularism is an opposing option, one that at best makes our job as Christian parents more difficult and at worst does irreparable harm to our children. We're deceiving ourselves if we believe otherwise.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Also, I can't agree with your analysis that I'm drawing any false dichotomies. Here's why. I understand you to mean that there are some secular schools that provide superior educational opportunities to some Christian schools; for example, Boise High versus what you once called "Ma and Pa's Shekhinah Glory Christian School." I concede that point; however, I assume you agree with the following statement: "With all other things being equal (quality of instructors and administrators, facilities, resources, etc.), a Christian education is superior to a secular education for the Christian student." That is to say, the best Christian school imaginable is superior to the best secular school imaginable for the Christian student. The Christian student (a student mind you, not necessarily a mature believer) will benefit more from studying history, language, literature, science, math, theology, and philosophy in light of a biblical worldview than they would through a secular worldview. Agree or disagree? If you agree we can move along; if not, I'd like you to try explaining your position one more time.

    I also contend with your analysis of 2 Timothy. In 2 Timothy (and the other two pastoral epistles), Paul isn't writing to the universal church, or even to Timothy as a Christian layman, but Paul is writing to him as a minister of the Gospel, ordained by the laying on of hands (1:6; 1 Tim 4:14.) Timothy isn't a ὁ άνθρωπος του θου, or a "man of God," in some general, ambiguous sense. Timothy was trained to be such: "continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of... from childhood you have known the ιερα γραματτα (the "Holy Scriptures"), which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus." Timothy is thoroughly equipped for every good work not because he's merely a believer, but because he has been taught the Scriptures from childhood. We can't expect someone to pass on knowledge of something which they themselves do not possess. That's one of the many problems I see with the American church today. How many parents can say they are in the same place as Timothy; that is, that "from childhood [they] have known the Holy Scriptures"? We are like heirs who have benefited from a great spiritual inheritance, and for two generations we have lived off the spiritual capital passed down to us by our grandparents and great-grandparents, without contributing anything to the account ourselves. Our spiritual bank account as a nation is dwindling, our inheritance nearly squandered. The church needs to return posthaste to the practice of training men and women like Timothy: men and women of God who are trained from childhood in the Holy Scriptures-which are able "to make you wise for salvation through which is in Christ Jesus." The primacy of the Bible in this process cannot be overstated. Christians are not "thoroughly equipped for every good work" because they merely believe; they are only thoroughly equipped—for righteousness, for doctrine, for reproof, for correction—if they are biblically literate. Yet, we subject our children to an educational system hell-bent on excluding mere references to the Bible from the curriculum, and instead inundating our children with a secular worldview and math and science education for 7 hours a day. The Christian parents' first priority should be equipping their children to do the work of the ministry, to live righteous lives, to be "good people," by providing them with an education with the Bible as its foundation. I'm advocating for an educational system that works in union with parents towards that goal, as opposed to the one that has been forced upon us that works in opposition to it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Your point about the importance and power of Christian love—αγαπε in Greek, or caritas in Latin—in the educational process between the parent and the student is well made. My question to you then is this: cannot the same be said about its importance and power in the process between educator and student? That is, will the educational process not be more effective and more powerful if it is accompanied by αγαπε, or Christian love? I think we can agree that it will be; ergo, we as parents should take every measure to ensure that our children are shepherded by educators who will love them as Christ loves them. I submit the likelihood of this increases at an institution where the educators are believers delivering a curriculum with the Bible as its foundation. Furthermore, it is my position that two generations of believers educated by the secular system has largely robbed the American church of any understanding of αγαπε; I submit to you the divorce rates among the Christian community as evidence. Christian love is not something that comes naturally to sinful man, it is something we are trained in and must practice at. We cannot expect parents, even believers, to be skilled at something for which they have not received training or practice, anymore than we can expect you or I to be skilled golfers. One of the few environments, in addition to at home and at the corporate church gathering, where Christians can receive training in αγαπε is Christian education. One of the many reasons Christians in America are failing to practice αγαπε is that they have been trained in a secular school.

    Thanks for the thoughtful discussion, Matt. I appreciate it as always!

    ReplyDelete
  5. You said, “Let me state unequivocally: it is the responsibility of the parent to ensure that their children receive what Paul called the παιδεία κυρίου, or the "education of the Lord."

    Excellent! We have an accord. I’d encourage you to remind your hearers of this as you continue to advocate for Christian education. Personally, it’s a major sticking point for me as I see it as a problem in the church—“the pillar and foundation of the truth”-- and believe it is much preferred to address this issue at the root of the problem.

    You said, “Also, I can't agree with your analysis that I'm drawing any false dichotomies…”

    Please be careful to note I’m addressing the content of your article and how your words may be received through written communication. This includes what you may have not communicated. It may be that you just need to further explain yourself. Being as such, you may frame my criticisms in the light of what people may think you are saying from the ideas you used to express your argument. However, it yet may be that we actually disagree on this matter as well or simply may not understand each other.

    I believe the church has been thoroughly equipped to shepherd its flock and has been called to do so; and should not be made dependent on anything outside itself to accomplish this mandate.

    “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom…” -- Colossians 3:16

    “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of Him.”
-- II Peter 1:3

    “And these words which I command you today shall be in heard in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in you house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. – Deut. 6:6,7

    “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” -- II Peter 1:5-8

    “But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you…” -- 1 Peter 3:15

    ReplyDelete
  6. It is a biblical imperative that these mandates be fulfilled in and through the church body. If the church is relying on a para-church organization to accomplish this it has forsaken its scriptural mandate to do so. As I read your article, your minimization of the church and parent’s effort came off as an extraneous afterthought in regards to the issue at hand. Moreover, your prescription to enroll our children in Christian school as the best remedy was taken as out of place and premature to this reader. If this was not your belief then we have no argument but I would still take issue with the way you communicated in this matter. I apologize if I you feel I have misconstrued your words or have plainly misunderstood you. By my lights, I would first look to the church and its leaders to exhort our parents and children. There is a major problem here if the church is not fulfilling this role. I didn’t get any sense of this by reading your article. Past this, I am very supportive of parents sending their children to a Christian school as a supplementary effort.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Your rebuttal and questions:

    I accept your correction on the book of Timothy but believe I can still make my case through the quoted scripture above. Timothy, as a “man of God” would then be thoroughly equipped to teach his hearers (i.e. our church leaders who have been charged with instructing us and our children). If a “man of God” is thoroughly equipped nothing is lacking. Agreed? This is where I saw the article *leaning* toward a false dichotomy. A false dichotomy leaves no room for a third alternative when such alternatives exist. In this case, I see the parents and church as such. You have agreed that parents are ultimately responsible to instruct their children in these matters. In the same way, I would give the church precedence over a para-church organization. I’m guessing you would agree as well. This idea was left out/minimized in your article when the church was referred to as a “45-minute” dismal hope.

    You said: “The Christian student (a student mind you, not necessarily a mature believer) will benefit more from studying history, language, literature, science, math, theology, and philosophy in light of a biblical worldview than they would through a secular worldview. Agree or disagree?

    Agreed. But, again, I see this as a supplementary effort to what the church and parents should already be providing.

    You said: “Your point about the importance and power of Christian love—αγαπε in Greek, or caritas in Latin—in the educational process between the parent and the student is well made. My question to you then is this: cannot the same be said about its importance and power in the process between educator and student? That is, will the educational process not be more effective and more powerful if it is accompanied by αγαπε, or Christian love?”

    Absolutely! However, I would give the parents and the church precedence in this instance and would not see Christian education through a para-church organization as equal or as an adequate replacement.

    You said: “We cannot expect parents, even believers, to be skilled at something for which they have not received training or practice, anymore than we can expect you or I to be skilled golfers.”

    If believers are not skilled it is because they have ignored God’s call to seek knowledge and wisdom, which He promises to give liberally to any one who asks.

    “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who give to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be give to him.”

    --James 1:5

    “My son, if you receive my words, And treasure my commands within you, So that you incline your ear to wisdom, And apply your heart to understanding; Yes, if you cry out for discernment, And lift up your voice for understanding, If you seek her as silver, and search for her as for hidden treasures; Then you will understand the fear of the LORD, and find the knowledge of God.” -- Proverbs 2:2-5

    I have enjoyed this exchange as well Chris and truly hope to help you in your pursuit and defense of Christian education.

    “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”
    -- Proverbs 27:17

    ReplyDelete