BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1623, 14 December 1912, Page 6

BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

LECTURE BY BISHOP CLEARY,

MOVEMENT KEENLY CRITICISED,

About 2500 people assembled in the Town Hall last night, when the Eoman Catholic Bishop of Auckland (Dr. Cleary] delivered a lecture entitled: The Bible-m-schools Movement in its relation to taxpayers, teachers, and pupils." The Mayor of the city (Mr. D. M'Laren) presided, and amongst those on the platform were Mr. T. M. Wilford, M.P., Professor M'Kenzie, Mr. A. B. Atkinson, and Mr. John Hutcheson. The meeting heartily' applauded the lecturer at frequent intervals. i Mayor's Invitation to Canon Garland. i The Mayor said that there were on the platf jrm men of various religions. There were catholics, and there were protestants. (Applause.) He would like, tho gentlemen who were fighting for the Bible-in-schools to exercise tolerance in their language. Some.people writing m£he press had said* that those who were opposing the Bible-in-schools were secularists. As Mayor of the city he sadd that he did not regard that as. a fair way of stating the position. He did not know if he would be accused of bavin? introduced a secularist that night. It seemed •■ to ' him that before • any appeal was made to the politicians of the country for a referendum, or for legislation,- or anything else, a serious responsibility rested upon Canon Garland, the league emissary, and others who supported the movement, to prove certain things, and he thought that the time had arrived when we 'should ask the league definitely to present their proofs. Something was wanted more than the mere -assertion that the Bible in Schools had been introduced in •' wew South Wales. New Zealand wanted to l&ow what it had produced. And, he ventured to invite-lie would not .say challenge, lest he ventured to be accused of bravado—Canon Garland definitely to offer positive proof:— . , 1. That the general average of education is higher amongst those trained under tho New South Wales, system than under tho New Zealand system. 2. That the moral standard of eano peoplo is higher in New : South Wales than it is in New Zealand. • ' '3. That criminality is less in New South Wales than in New Zealand. 4. That there is a higher standard of ■religious observance amongst sane people in New South. Wales than exists in New Zealand. ' '•

"I will leave these four questions as tests," continued the Mayor, "and wait in humbleness for the proofs." (Applause.) . The Bishop's Address. "The New .Zealand Government," commenced Bishop Cleary, "has undertaken many functions, from the building of railways; to the grading of buff orpingtons and Canterbury lamb. Our friends of the Bible in State Schools League are now agitating to force the Government to take up yet another role —that of a teacher of religion. The league, furthermore, demands, in this connection, no fewer- than seven alterations in our existing law—alterations which, collectively, involve the most momentous changes in our Education Act, in tho relations of the St.ite towards the various religious denominations, and in the relations of the various relipious denominations towards the State and towards each other. League orators have been industriously glossin? over and minimising the'nature, extent, and results of these proposed legislative changes. It 'Trill, therefore,- be well to deal with each of them in some detail."

The first proposed alteration in the law, he said, was that' the Government was to' be a religious teacher. : The law of New Zealand did not provide for the Government's directly setting up, through Government- ''officials; as a'teacher: of; religion, The league'was agitating to alter; • in this respect, our existing legislation. In the Auckland "Herald"'of September 21, 1912, the ofiicial. organiser declared that his league advocated the introduction, into New Zealand, of the system now in operation'in New South' Wales, Tasmania, Western Australia, and Queensland. Section? of the New South Wales Act provided for class-time Biblical lessons by State officials, from a hook of Scripture extracts provided by the Government; it also provided •. for official "general religious teaching" of the sectarian type, known; as "non-sectarian." Provision was also made for the clergy to give denominational religious instruction during school' hoars. Western Australia had copied these provisions word for. word. -, Tasmania and Queensland had provisions practically identical in purport and effect. In the league's pamphkt, "Opinions of Education- Experts," there was copious official, evidence, that "religious instruction" was actually so imparted by the State, through State servants, as a regular class-subject of the State schools. "A State-School Religion." . The second change in the law sought was the establishment of a State-school religion. In a country of profound reli-. gious divisions, one naturally asked: What type of Biblical and "general religious teaching" was it proposed to . duce? The league supplied, directly or by implication, a sufficient answer. The Government, entering upon its role as a teacher of religion, was to provide a text-book for this Biblical and "general religious teaching," presumably with active aid and comfort from the league— the league becoming, in such case, the official adviser of the State in matters of faith and morals. Following the Australian lead, the new official text-book of Scripture lessons would be ma<se up wholly or chiefly of extracts from a sec'tarian version of the Bible. The general idea, in such schemes, was not freely to select extracts (as the churches did) suited to various .public and personal uses; the idea was rather (as Australian experience had showfi) to garble the Bible in such a. Wav as to construct from it a sort of. "skeleton Christianity" unobjectionable to the sorely-divided reformed groups for whom these lessons were primarily intended. Nothing was further from the mind of the Bible-in-State Schools League than to introduce tho Bible into the State schools. . The talk we occasionally heaTd abont 'the battle for the open Bible" was the mere oratorical vapour of over-ardent advocates who, having got to the end of their facts and arguments, would best serve their country by sitting down. ■ The irreconcilable principles of Biblical interpretation had divided Western Christianity for several hundred years. On the face of at, the issue is a dogmatic and sectarian one. The loaguo demanded that the Now Zealand Government should take sides in this old dogmatic quarrel—that it should adopt, for practical use in ffie public schools, the sectarian and denominational principle of private judgment, which was honestly and conscientiously rejected by people of various religious views, -"A Legalised Endowment." New Zealand law did not at present ptovide for the direct endowment of any form of religious teaching fit the expense of the public purse. The league was agitating for siich a legalised endowment. The Government of New Zealand taxed tne people of the whole nation for the cost of education. The whole people were entitled to share in that taxation in a form or forme which they can all properly accept. This sound principle of statecraft was denied by the Bible-in-Schoole League. Here they had the evil penal principle of taxation without beneficial use. Tho league demanded by law, at the public cost, the class-teaching of a form of religion suited to Its own consolentione convictions. By what moral right did tho league deny to other classes of conscience the legjieletlve privileges whioh it olaimed for itself? Aβ to the right of oonscience of teachers. Bishop Cleary 6aid that under the existing New Zealand kw no one wns compelled to conduct Biblical and "general religi-o-ue teaching" of any kind—much less Biblical and "general religioiie teaching"— at variance with his conscientious convictions. The league proposed to make such religious teaching-compulsory, bylaw, for all State school teachers, irrespective of Conscientious Objectors. How did the league propose to deal with the conscientious objectors? It said it would "trust the teachers." "Let us see how it trusts the teachers?" Tho league "trusted the teachers'' by denying to them even ■ the eham "protection" of a conscience clause. It "trusted tho toaohere" h? muKzlinif tlusn with a nejj TTnJlgßßity.

Act, and denying to tiara an elemontaTy right of conscience, -which was enjoyed by the worst criminals under lock and key in the Terrace Gaol. What were the penalties of remissness? Bad inspectorial reports, slow or arrested promotion. What were the penalties of refusal? Dismissal, as surely as if they were convicted felons. "The teacher who objects must give way to one who won't." These were the words of a league orator quoted in the "New Zealand Journal of Education" for November, 1912. Continuing, the Bishop said:— Examino the declared facts- mid principles of We Bible-in-Schools denominations. They_ maintain, one and all, that freedom of conscience is the birthright of all; that rights of conscience are rights that God gave, and man cannot take away; ana they fling a golden glory around .those , who rfyed the hillsides of England and ScotAnd with blood rather than violate conscience, at the bidding of ruling majorities. Now, in regard to teachers, they would punish fidelity to conscience as if it were a felony. On.the league denominations' own professed prinr ciples the teachors would bo justified in resorting to every moral means to make this scheme of conscienceviolation a dead letter, if it should ever become law. And in such an effort tha teachers would, I believe, have tho material and moral support of every trite democrat in this Dominion."

Dissident Children. ' The plain intent and effect of tho league's conscience clause was to capture for sectarian purposes the following classes of dissident children: (a) Tlio child-' ren of objectors, who (as formerly in Otago) were unaware of the right of withdrawal; (b) the children of objectors, who, however vehement their dislike to the system, failed to set their protest down in., writing, owing to inability to write, or to mere neglect, or to the liabit of putting off, or to the dislike of composing formal letters to educated and .presumably critical .men; (c) objectors' children, who (whether provided or unprovided with certificates of exemption) had' the common imitative tendency of children to do as the majority of their companions did; (d) dissident children who, owing to their trained habit of following tho teacher from one class-subject to another, had thereby , acquired a cultivated tendency to drift after him into Biblical and "general religious teching"; (e) dissident children, of only normal childish force of character, who were placed between these two alternatives: either to. remain for religious teaching, or to stand outsido on, perhaps, sodden ground, or exposed to rain, hail, or snow. This applied especially to , ono-roomed State schools, which were two-thirds of tho entire number. large groups of children of various faiths would be thus, irrespective of written protests, exposed to. the influence of sectarian teachings at variance with the known conscientious religious convictions of their parents. "A Rather Strange Proposal." The clergy of various faiths were to have the legal right (not now accorded) to give denominational religious instruc. tion in the public schools during working hours. -On this aspect Bishop Cleary said: "(a) This seems a rather strange proposal to come from an organisation which protests so vehemently against deriominationalism. (b) The proposed privilege is. advanced by way of levelling objectors up to 'equal rights' with those demanded for itself by the Bible-in-Schools League. A. fine comedy of 'equality,' in good sooth! . (c) 1 It is hardly necessary to point out the practical difficulty of its working, especially in one-roomed schools, (d) The league has published eonie figures regarding the operation of the right of entry in New South Wales. According to these figures, the three strongest protestnnt denominations total ,■ about 03 per cent, of the total instructional visits to tile . schools; all the others, only about seven- per cent. In, practical effect, this, is another provision to further the . denominationalisiug of the public schools in the interests of tie large religious bodies. Tho smaller ones must take what .crumbs of , comfort they can get. . : The seventh proposed cliange was that a majority vota should decide a matter, of conscience.

"The existing law of. New Zealand," he said, "makes no provision for determining matters of religion and conscience by a count of voters' heads. The league demands new and special legislative machinery so to decide the following question of religion and conscience: Shall the kind of Biblical nnrf gpni'vul religions instruction, already described, be forced as a class subject upon the public schools, compulsorily taught by teachers, of all. creeds, and paid for out of the common purse? Here (as in the casn of ' the teachers) the.league denominations abandon their own professed principles anil the common teaching of Christianity, that rights of conscience are rights of God, nml .that -the rights of confcionre of a minority are as sacred and inviolable as the rights of conscience of a majorityi The league's proposed plebiscite is a naked appeal to the physical force of numbers, a declaration Hint' intent 1* right, a proclamation of the ■ old, discarded political fallacy that "minorities must suffer." Happily, Parliament ?enerally recognises its limitations and does not interfere in what it regards as mutters of religion and conscience. Perhaps the roost deplorable feature of the movement - is this: Its official organiser .has, without protesf from the league, flung out an anti-Pripdy banner, 'blazoned with the false issue: "Home Rule or Borne Ku*e?" Here we have a frank appeal to those sectarian passions which have wrought much evil in Bible-in-schoo's States beyond the Tns- ■ man Sea.- Here, too, we have timely warning evidence' as to the sort of passions which may be made to circle in a wild danco around a plebiscite upon this issue. . ' . . "Knotty Points." ' The lecturer concluded, with the follow* ing summary: —"Tlie issue is one, not of physical force, but of moral right, and upon the.league devolves the burden of justifying the seven changes which they are agitating to. introduce into Now Zealand. Here are the 'nnotty points' 6et forth in summary form :— "1. By what moral right would the Government of New Zealand set up as.by law, a teacher of religion ? • "2. By what moral right would the New Zealand Government force, by law, upon the public schools, as part of the regular class-work, an exclusive schemo of Biblical and 'general religious teaching' admittedly suited for only one group of consciences, and admittedly at variance with all other groups of consciences? "3. By what moral right would, the Now Zealand Government force objecting taxpayers, by law, to pay for tho propaganda of Biblical and 'general religious teaching' at variance with their conscientious religious convictions? "L By what moral right wo7iM-tho New Zealand Govornment compel objecting teachers, by law, under rain of dismissal, to impart 'Biblical and '.eeneral religious teaching' at variance with, their conscientious religious convictions and with the practice or discipline of their respective faiths? , . ■ , ' "5. By what moral right would the >?cw Zealand Government force, by law, upon the public schools, an exaggerated form of a conscience clause which was devised for: the express purposes of proselytism ? "6. How, precisely, would the mere riofot of clerical entry, for religious instruction, level up objectors to 'equality of rights' with those demanded by the leas Tie? , , - ' ■ "7. What moral right has any Government or any people, to decide a question of religion and conscience by a count of voters' heads? Is the league prepared to follow majority rulo of conscience w> Its logical issue? "In one shape or ofhor. these knotty pointe hove been before the league ever since the beginning of this agitation. The league has steadily evaded thorn. Upon it lies the burden of justifying its forreaching demands. Let us h<g>e its leadera will take heart of grace, and now, at length, equarcly face tne issues which they themselves have raised. (Loud applause.) Resolution In Protest. Mr T. M. Wilford, M.P.; offered "a few words of congratulation" to Bishop Cleary "on an able exposition of an intricate and difficult subject." Mr. Wilford said that he was not of. the same'religion as Bishop Cleary, but that fact did not prevent his acknowledging the erudition, learning, and conspicuous ability with which his lordship had treated the subject. Ho hoped that the resolution he was about to move would be carried with enthusiasm, because one of the things to be feared was thatajathy which was one. of the constitutional ailments of.tho peoplo of this oountry. Religious tolerance meant

tolerance meant bitterness, hatred, and unc'haritableness. He moved: That, 03 citizens and taxpayers of this Dominion, we pledge ourselves to oppose the scheme of the Bible in State Schools' League ns nn invasion of the rights of conscience and inimical to the .jeal interest of religion and religious peace. Mr. John Hutcheson seconded the motion. He honed that something like a national organisation would be promoted to prevent the Bible in Schools Lcajiu. "doing this thins; in this fair laud." The Mayir called for a show of hands, and then* declared tbo motion carried, with only five dissentients. On the motion of Mr. A. R. Atkinson a vote of thanks was accorded Bishop deary for his lecture. ,

CANON GAM.AND. MEETINGS TjMYANGANUI. (By Tolesrapli.—Press Association.) Wannanui, December 13. Canon Garland is at present in Wanganui in connection with the movement to introdiico tho Biblo into the schools. He has already addressed several meetings, and barring a • few keen opponents, is receiving good support.