Indifference to redemption is the attitude that marks the extent of sin's corruption of the human will. Under the influence of sin, the field is barren and the field-hand drowsy and careless, seemingly unaware that the misery of the field is not its essence, that the hardness of the field's surface is not its creational texture. Christian teaching takes up the shovel, as it were, and digs. The Christian teacher's hands are steady on the handle, sensitive to the soil, and purposive ' but not hegemonic. Learners find motive for curiosity when the care-giving impulse meets the mysteries of creation with confidence that mystery is not perpetual and discovery is not spiritually neutral.
Teaching shapes the mind.
Disciplines are helpful distinctions by which learners organize knowledge and in which learners dialogue. Disciplines are not mutually exclusive or isolated domains of knowledge. A calcified discipline refuses dialogue from outside its elites and narrows dialogue to its own upper tier. But disciplines rightly function as communities of learners associated with a set of problems and engaged in a specialized methodology and language which enhances the organization and validation of discovery. Teaching shapes the mind by eliciting submission to the discoveries of the community.