The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1875-05-20
The school Question.

During the convention of the German
Catholic Societies of the United States at
Cincinnati, Bishop McQuaid, OF Rochester,
d livered lecture on estate Education and
State Schools" which is attracting great
deal of attention. Bishop McQuaid may be
accepted as the champion of the Catholic
Church in this country upon the subject of
education, as he has been the earliest ablest
and boldest advocate of the policy of giving
the state schools religious bias.
In considering the subject of education,
Bishop McQuaid starts out from the axiom
that the most important element IN eduea-
ton is moral and religious instruction. He
holds, as indeed all religious thinkers do,
that il Is more essential to a good and
virtuous community that it be well
grounded in morals than in secu-
luar knowledge. His premise is that
any education worthy of the name must be
built upon a religious basis. He maintains
that the education of child is a matter that
primarily concerns the parents. but he ac-
knowledges the interest of the nation in the
education of its citizens, and would not OBJ
iect to its agency in the great work.
state manages child's educa-
ton, he maintains that the process
must be a religious one in order to produce
the best results. His quarrel with the pres
ent school system is that it is secular, and in
so far as it is secular he regards it as involv-
ing a waste of the best opportunity for
holding the minds of the young in the
right direction. Wherever it is partly re-
ligious, as for instance in localities
where the Bible is read, and hymns
sung, he considers it so far excellent as
Protestant system. and only objects to it as
unjust to Catholics, Jews and infidels, who
pay taxes TO support it. His theory is that
good Presbyterian will be better citizen
than an indifferent one, a good Catholic
better citizen than one who knows little
about his religion, and an earnest Jew
better citizen than one careless
about his faith. To make the
process of ed ucation, therefore, a religion
one, Bishop McQuaid advocates the divis-
ion of the school moneys among the various
sects for the support of schools in which the
dogmas OF each sect can be taught in con-
neotion with ordinary secular studies. So
important does he consider this religious
elt ment in education that he has adopted
the policy of building costly Catholic
schools in his own diocese, and, in the city of
Rochester, the children attending them
are nearly equal in number to those attend
ing the public schools. The present system
be regards as a practical abandonment of
education by all the sects to the infidels,
and be defends the proposed reformation as
more just, effective and American.
To such a course of argument there are
many objectiOns-so many in fact that it is
not easy to conjense them into the compass
of an editorial. 1t may be acknowledged
that religious and moral instruction is the
most important element in child's educa-
ton, and yet 1t does not follow that il is
the business of the state to take charge of
the religious and moral education of chill
dren. In this country it has been de-
termined to leave these branches entirely in
the control of the parents and the churches.
For teaching them We have literally no
common school system, and the
work is done by private enter
prise, all creeds standing on an
equality. The state simply busies itself
with secular knowledge, which parents aud
churches ara little apt to forget, and which
is, nevertheless, of vast practical Importance.
The fallacy of Bishop McQuaid's argument
lies in assuming that the state education
involves al the instruction which child il
10 receive and occupies all the time which
he can devote to study. The truth IL thatthe
purely secular education Of the common
schools occupies but a small portion of
caild's existence, and leaves abundance OF
opportunity for religious and moral instruc-