The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1868-12-13
GODDESS EDUCATION


The following article under the above
caption is from the New York Tablet In it
will be found a strong argument for the
plan advocated in our last issue, of a pro-
rata allowance made to all children ed
ucated gratuitously in private schools.
This is subject ofse much importance to
the poor, question involving SO much of
justice and humanity, that we can hardly
be accused of reiteration in keeping it pro-
minenty before the public:
We have sufficiently shown that educa-
ton without religious training is worse than
none. and that the proper religious training
is not practicable in our public schools.
We have shown, also, that education is Il
function Of the Church or body that has
charge Of religion, and that the State has
no more to do with it than it has with the
teachings of religion itself. Religion is the
principal thing, and there is no such sharp
line of demarcntion between religious train
ing and secular education as our public
school system presupposcs. The two sorts
of education may, undoubtedly, be distin-
gujshed, but cannot be separated without
injury to both. They should be given to-
gether in the schoelroom, if we mean that
religion and secular knowledge should work
together through life.
If,the whole population of the country
were of one religion, system of public
schools might be adopted that would be
unobjectionable. If, for instance ,tte Amer
o lean people were all Catholics, the common
schools, as to their internal management
and the education given in them, light be
placed under charge of the Church, and
the State retain the care of providing funds
for their support, and continue to control
the prudential affairs. But sach is not the
case. Catholics constitute only u minority
of the American people, and we cannot eX
tbo f,at I,rli. fa n
system of Catholic schools for non Catholic
children. Even if we were the ma ority and
had the power, we should have no right to
compel the minority to send their children
to schools designed to train their pupils in
the Catholic religion, or to tax them for the
support Of such schools. Conscience is not
a matter to be determined by majorities,
and in religious matters minorities have all
the rights Of majorities. AS long as there
are different religions in the community no
one system of schools or of education can
be rightfully enforced upon the whole coun-
try. The experiment of a purely secu1arior
goddess education has been tried, and from
it our whole country is suffering.
e. What is the remedy o. The remedy can
DE found only in u sy stem of denominational
schools, or else in placing education on the
same footing with religion itself; that Is,
leaving each religious division to support
its own schools and educate it's children in
its Own way, as the Catholics are now doing,
although compelled by law to pay their
quota for the public schools, which they
cannot use.
This East we may call the voluntary sys-
tenn. 1t is objected to on the ground that
the we'll being of the state of the secular
order requires that all the children of the
land should lac educated, and under purely
voluntary system numbers would grow up
uneducated; but the well-being of the
secular order is no more interested in
having all the children of the land edu-
Gated than it is in having all the people
truly religious and devoted to the Christian
faith and worship. Every argument that
can be used in favor of a public provision
for education bears equally in favor of
public provision for the support of religion.
AS education IS, after all, function of the
Church, no reason can be assigned why the
voluntary system should be more objection
able in regard to education than in regard
to religion. If we approve the system with
regard to religion, how can we consistently
disapproYe it with regard to edgcation7