The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1913-11-08

TO OUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM
AND SUGGESTS A PLAN FOR
THE APPoRTIoNMENT OF STATE
AID-THE UNcHANGEABLEP RIN-
cIPLEs OF MORALITY SHOULD
GUIDE THE INDIVIDUAL AND
THE NATION.
In the course of an address deliv.
niversary of the Flag Day. held as
protest against the mo God, No
Master" parade of the Socialists, the
Honorable Bird S. Coler of New York,
who will lecture in the Pro-Cathedral,
Minneapolis, on Sunday evening, No
vember Is, made plea for the re-
introduction of religion into the pub
lie school system of the United States
as the most effective method of COM
batting the insidious advances of So
cialism. He said in part:
1--WE are aiding Socialism vastly by
taking religion out of our public
schools. We are spending millions
of money for an educational system
which has no religious content. We
are doing this in the face of the ex-
preston of every educator of note
from Plato down to the present day,
that an education without morals is
evil rather than good
eve are turning out of these pub
| lie schools for which we pay so much
money graduates who believe that
science has demolished religion;
whose whole training has been given
with the object of preparing them for
material success. Their idea of life
is false Their idea of science is false
Even in the secular and practical
things of life they lack the thorough
ness and proficiency of the graduates
of generation ago.
eve must reintroduce religion into
our educational system if we are to
have righteous Nation and to stand
up against this red tide. There has
been opposition on the ground that we
are denominationally divided but a
plan has been proposed so just and
so simple that | cannot understand
the prejudice against it.
A Plan for State Aid.
This plan is for the State simply
to pay for service rendered by educa-
tors and in so paying not to discrim-
mate against some teachers because
they are persons who have devoted
themselves to the particular service
of Cod Let every creed control it's
own schools, and if it gives sufficient
secular education to pass an examina-
ton by the State regent on secular
subjects, then let the State pay per
capita for the education of each child
so educated
Let even the agnostics maintain
| their own educational institutions, let
there be no injustice to any class or
any creed. In this way instead of
| turning our great educational fund in
to war chest for the Socialist party,
we shall inform and inspire the future
generation of American citizens SO
as to cut out the evils at present ex-
listing in our political life, and in our
| industrial system to develop the vast
increasing civilization.
Then shall we have an American
people increasing in righteousness and
justice and redeeming the fair pledge
| that was set in the Heavens when
| first our glorious American flag was
/ 11nfl1r1nd fo tha hrooZp F"
Need of Moral Standards.
In another part of his address he
dwelt upon the Interchangeable princi-
pies of morality and their absolute
need in the life of the individual and
of the nation.
"The fundamental principles of
morality" he said, ARE indestructible
facts. They are essentially the same
science In every branch of human
experience we find these two opposing
! forces, whether it be an abstract
science like mathematics, whether it
be in acoustics where truth produces
harmony and untruth produces dis
cord, whether it be mechanics, where
truth produces a smooth-running and
useful piece of machinery and untruth
results in disorder and self-destruc-
ton; or in Jurisprudence, where I'M
truth produces oppression and truth
produces Justice 1t is absurd, there
fore, to suppose, as SO many do in this
generation, that morality is manu-
featured thing, changeable at the
within of man, or, at least, subject to
modification by the material condi-
tions which environ him.
Mans supreme distinction in the
field of creation is his moral con-
seriousness. In each of us there is
| the eternal conflict between good and
evil A will power rightly developed
and informed enables us to suppress
within ourselves what is wrong A
spiritual faculty which no material sci
ence has been able to explain gives to
us capacity for influencing, even in
others, the determination of this strug-
gle between good and evil Good men
can impart some of their virtue to
their neighbors.
! Sane men can influence commune
ties in the direction of sanity. A COM
munity drifting in the wrong direc-
ton can awaken itself to the dangers
which encompass it, can pierce
through the illusions which sometimes
make vague the outlines of evil in