BIBLE-IN-SCHOOLS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2285, 20 October 1914, Page 7

BIBLE-IN-SCHOOLS

EVIDENCE BEFORE COMMITTEE

CASE FOR THE BILL OPENED

TRIAL IN NEW SOUTH WALES \

Hearing of evidence on the petitions presented to Parliament this session, praying that the Religious Instruction in Schools Referendum Bill should not be passed was continued by the Education Committee of the House of /Representatives yesterday morning. Evidence in favour of the petitions was concluded, and two witnesses in favour of religious instruction in State schools were called. A Repudiation. . Mr. D. C. Bates made the following statement to the Committee: Before further cross-examination, I. wish to repudiate the document presented as evidence to ine by Canon Garland last Friday, entitled "Report of the Special Religious Instruction in Public Schools, , submitted to Synod. 1913." It was. as I surmised at the time, a special plea for monetary, support for lay preachers to take the .place of Anglican clergy in the State schools m tho diocese of Sydney. It deos not, I find, contain the quotations made by Mr. Caughley and myself, and is not what it purports to bo, but I beg- to submit for your inspection genuine reports of Synod for 1910 and 1913. I have read scores of references such as those I have quoted in my mam evidence, and I have copied out many oi them. I desire, also, to ask that if. through Canon Garland's methods of cross-oxamination, it was incorporated into my evidence, it may now be ex-, punged. It was the only piece of evir dence I accepted in this way, and 1 now wish to repudiate it entirely," ,■ Cross-examined by Professor Hunter, Mr. Bates said that he was not a mem-: bor of the National Schools Defence League, and he had not wished to take any part in the controversy until he saw the methods being used by tho Bible-in-schools party. , Hβ would say with confidence that there were thousands of people in the Anglican munity who did not approve pf Canon Garland's propaganda. His experience taught him that the New South Wales text-book was unsuitable for the purpose for which, it was compiled, and that it was so considered by the JNew South Wales teachers. He did no« think any teacher could give simple Bible lessons without raising religious and sectarian issues. Hβ did not chink it was possible to teach lessons simply and graphically without teaching dogmatically. •'■■'. This concluded the evidence in favour of the petitions/ and Canon Garland announced that his witnesses would be the Rev. G. S. Cook, Methodist .minister at Tborndon, the Rev. W. A. keay, Congregational minister, at Auckland, the Rev, James Paterson, -PresbyKrcan minister at Christehurch. Methodists' Attitude. . The Rev. G. S. Cook said . that the 'Methodist Church was not, as was alleged, being dragged at-, the' chariot wheels of the Church of England in supporting the Bible-in-Schools League mid its appeal -for a referendum. The Methodist' Church supported the plat- . form of the league as a result of longestablished convictions and .experience, and careful and independent inquiry with which tho Church of England had nothing ; to do. In 1911 the larger of the two' Methodist Churches . of New Zealand set up a strong committee to inquire into the working of religious instruction in the Australian State Echools. The evidence supplied to the committee showed that the system had always, given general satisfaction wherever tried, that difficulties had not arisen through right of entry or from teachers, that proselytism was unknown, that there was hostility on the part of the Roman Catholic hierarchy, but that no serious attempt had ever been made to alter the system. The Rev. G'. Rowe, ex-president of tho Queensland and West Australian Conferences, wrote saying: "I trust our Church in New Zealand will go for the system. Don't be afraid of 'bpgies.' No real difficulty' arises in practical working. There is no parallel to the Old Country and it is outside the question to raise the Old Country difficulties."' The committee reported to the ■ New Zealand Conference of 1912, and the 'Australian system was heartily endorsed. Since then the United Methodist Church in conference had twice reaffirmed the platform of the league. New South Wales Experience. He had had an excellent opportunity of seeing the scheme in operation, as he was born in New South Wales, attended the State schools as a pupil, and afterwards sent his own boy to them. He had two brothers who were State school teachers in' New South Wales, •one with 24 years' experience, and one ■with 17 years', and through them he kept in touch with tho inner working of the Now South Wales methods. He had been a New Zealander for fifteen years, had served on school committees in the Dominion, and had a son who wasa State school teacher. In 1909 he spent three months .in New South Wales, visited the schools again, spent a good deal of time with school teachers, and made special inquiry concerning the working of the Scripture lessons uiulor the new syllabus which prevailed since 1905. As a pupil in tho New South Wales schools he had been taught nearly all his Scripture lessons by three teachers, one of whom was a Presbyterian, one an agnostic, and one • a. Roman Catholic. ,He had not been taught any of their doctrines, but received the Scripture lessons in a clear and interesting fashion. He would place them in the -following order as teachers of these lessons:—The Roman Catholic first, the. agnostic second, and the Presbyterian a good third. Ministers' visits were always cordially welcomed in his experience. In his own case ho received more benefit from the teacher's Scripture lessons than from the minister's teaching, but both sets of lessons were helpful, and he had never known ■ a teacher who did not consider the minister's visits a help to the. school. There wore no Roman Catholic echools in tho localities when he attended school, and Roman Catholic parents did not take advantago of the conscience clause. A few others did so, but the children suffered no persecution on that account. Tho lessons by teachers and ministers did not create sectarian strife,' nor was denominational loyalty destroyed. No Violation of Conscience. So far as ministers' visits were ■concerned, the complaint on tho part of the teachers was that they did not get more of these. Owing to the fact that the population was .-.scattered, and many of the parishes were undermanned, it was physically impossible for ministers to visit all the schools, hut to say that ministerial visits to the echools had become a dead letter was an assertion contradicted by all the facts. Although thero was a larger proportion of Roman Catholic teachers in New South Wales than in our Dominion, and he knew of one Jew teacher in New South Wales, ho never heard that• tho teacher's conscience was vtolated by giving those lessons, until ho came to New Zealand. It was affirmed by Bishop deary that no Roman Cattholic could teach theso lessons unless ho were badly trained in tho faith, or disloyal to tho Church, or being tomoted by lucrativo considerations, and

[the weakness of human nature. Dr. ' Cleary had also stated that a teacher had informed Bishop Gallaher, of Goulburn, in New South Wales, that Roman Catholio teachers hated the lessons, shirked them when they could, and if compelled to give them, made them as Roman Catholic in tendency a-spossible. Hie reply to that was that it was ir plain fact to those who knew, that these teachers came from good Roman Catholic families, that they were to the front in tho functions of their Churches in thoir respective localities, and in no way under the ban of the Church. Ho hail never heard of Rgman Catholic : bishops in New South Wales taking the position towards the teachers as laid Sown by Bishop ,Cleary, and judging by the vory large number of Roman Catholics entering tho schools as teachers, this held good throughout tho State. He was tqld on good authority of facilities to enter theservice_ being provided by the. Church. Regarding the statement made by the teacher to Bishop Gallaher, it was not credible, witness believed, that the Roman Catholic teachers should : make a practice of shirking the lessons or of teaching TTo-. man Catholic doctrines without attracting notico on tlie part of tho many who are jealously watchful of these tilings. ' Quoting statistics, Mr. Cook said it was apparent that at least 70,000 children in New Zealand were outside the Sunday Schools,, and that a large proportion of the remainder were very irregularly instructed. He argued strongly that the success of the Sunday school system in Victoria as compared with New ' South ' Wales was due to causes quite apart from the existencein New. South Wales of a. system of religious instruction. . ;. ■ . No Need for Conscience Clause. • Cross-examined by Professor Hunter, witness had" .had no experience as a minister in charge of a parish in Now South Wales. His own experience was that ministers had no difficulty in keeping order in classes they controlled. There had been a tremendous decrease of recent years in the crime rate of New South Wales, and this had been ascribed to education. On the question of- whether, by their being com-/ [Jelled to give Biblo lessons, the consciences of New Zealand teachers would be violated, he held that in any case, ae'teachers were the servants of the people, the people had a right to au opinion l on that question, and a right to have the question decided by the people's opinion. He did not consider that it was unjust to impose upon leathers the necessity of teaching undenominational lessons. He would not bo in favour of separating the issues to be submitted to a plebiscite, knowing how well the system had worked as a whole. He would be iopposed to giving a conscience clause for' teachers, because Australian experience showed that it was liot necessary. There was also danger to the teacher, in that the conscience clause would throw on him the onus, especially in sole-charge schools, of deciding whether the lessons were to be given or not. This wouldmake the.teacher's position embarrassing. . . ' :'■'.- Professor Hunter: If the teachers wish to have it, and are willing to take the consequences, are you prepared to give it to them? Mr. Cook: I am not prepared to give it to them, for the sake of the system. Continuing, ho said ho believed, the Nelson system, yas good as far "as it went, and he nau.no objection to it as far as it went, but it would be of least use where most needed—in the sparsely populated districts. He was not aware of any case of a teacher giving voluntary Bible lessonf outside of school hours, under the Nelson system. To Canon Garland: Mr. Cook said that the Methodist' Church had been fully consulted through its local Church Courts on the question of religious instruction in schools. He did not know of one teacher in Now South Wales who did not use the text books provided for use in -the" schools. Whole-hearted Support. The Rev. W. A. Keay, Congregational minister, said he had had experience of the , Bible-iu-State-schcols system .as a boy. in the .State schools of New South Wales, and afterwards as a minister of the Congregational Church. His. experience led him 'to a whole-hearted support of the scheme now before the people of the' Dominion. Hie attitude of his~denomination in New South Wales was one of unanimous approval of the Bible leesons given by .the teachers, and the right of entry on the part of the clergy, and he was sure that if the system was not showing all round fairness to all denominations the Congregational Church • '.Would have been one of the .first to oppose it. In all his experience he had never heard of one case of proselytism being attempted. On the contrary, he affirmed that tEero was a better uhcterBtanding among the various denominations in New South Wales—Anglican included—than obtained in any other State, and he was firmly of opinion that tho Biblo-in-sohools system was responsible for this breaking down of denominational prejudice. He had never met a teacher who refused to give the losson, or one whose conscience was hurt by tho /supervising of the Bible- !. reading lesson. The only complaint Irs bad ever met with from a teacher Was when tho minister was remiss in attending to his duty .in carrying out the "right-of-entry clause." He was confident that the introduction of the scheme into this country, far from_ being an evil, would work unqualified , good,' and would. prove to be the solution of the present religious difficulty. Tho committee adjourned until 10;30 a.m. to-day.