Evening Post. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1913. TO DISRUPT THE SCHOOLS?

Evening Post, Volume LXXXV, Issue 37, 13 February 1913, Page 6

Evening Post. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 1913. TO DISRUPT THE SCHOOLS?

The great meeting held by the Bible* in-Schools League in the Town Hall on' Tuesday has not received the attention that it deserves owing to the almost complete monopoly of the public mind by the tragic news from the Antarctic. But people should be better able to appreciate the significance of the meeting to-day than they were yesterday, and we trust that they will now give it their close attention. .Previous attacks upon the integrity of the State school system have been rebelled because its supporters have been vigilant and active in its defence. Whait we want them to realise is that it is only by a display of the same qualities now that the schools can be saved. The attack that is now being directed at the national system of education is more formidable, because better organised and inspired by greater confidence than was ever the case before, Yet the supporters of the system continue to regard the movement with an 'easy optimism born of the knowledge that the system has lasted more than thirty-five years and that all previous attacks have failed. We are speaking in general terms, but we gladly recognise that in Wellington especially some of the most convinced believers in the present system have shown themselves to be very much on the alert, and that both here and elsewhere organisations have been formed for the defence of the- system. Better still, the various local Schools Defence Leagues that have been formed during the -last few months were brought into touch with one another at a conference held in Wellington a week ago. The outcome of this conference was the formation of a New Zealand Schools Defence League, to which it \is hoped to see all the different local organisations affiliated. We trust that the aims of the promoters of the conference will be realised, and that avigorous and persistent propaganda will be sustained in defence of the national system until its assailants have been repelled as decisively, as on every previous occasion. ; We are, of course, told from time to i time that the true friends of the national system of education are those who are endeavouring to add religious teaching to the curriculum. But in our opinion a system of education cannot properly be described as national if its »t imculum is not such that the children of all denominations and Of no denomination can share in it on equal terms without the raising of any sectarian differences either for parents or for teachers. Dr. Young 1 man, the president of the Australasian Methodist Conference, who was the prin cipal speaker at Tuesday's meeting, laid great stress upon the unifying effect of the Bible-in-Schools movement in Australia. But what sort of unity has it produced? A unity among the Protestant Churches, and this is all that Dr. Youngman claims for it. " Even if the league had failed in its objective," he said, "it had accomplished what was worth all the money, all the work, all the trouble expended — namely, the bringing of the Protestant Churches together and uniting them on this question in a way that nothing else could, he thought, have done." This may be very satisfactory for the Protestant Churches. Religious. sects have in the old days suspended their minor differences in order to unite in the persecution of a common enemy, and whatever the enemy may have thought about the arrangement it was very satisfactory for them. With the differences required by the manners and methods of to-day, this seems to be just what is taking place now. The Protestant Churches are. uniting to compel a, minority of Roman Catholics and others to pay for the endowment of a form of religious teaching to which the minority objects, and naively invites us to rejoico at the triumph of Protestant unity which the combination represents. We lay (stress upon the endowment aspect of the question, because the conscience clause which will allow Roman Catholics, Jews, and other dissentients to withdraw their children ivom the reUgldus lessons is often' spoken of m

though it solved the problem. But this generous privilege will not relieve the minority from the injustice of paying as taxpayers for the endowment of religious teaching agaihst which their consciences rebel. That the spirit of intolerance— which is essentially the spirit of persecutionstill lingers under tho disguises imposed by modern conventions was proved by tho omissions no less than by the statements of the speakers at the Town Hall. While Dr. Youngman rejoices m a Protestant alliance which i ho believes to be. strong enough to carry I its point, not a word was paid as to the gross injustice with which the Roman Catholics and others who, from the standpoint of Protestant orthodoxy, are heretics, are threatened. A Roman Catholic may be a man and a brother, and possibly even an agnostic may be tho same. But to what rights are their consciences entitled in the presence of a religious intolerance which has the supreme merit of uniting the chief Protestant denominations? Dr. Youngman's rejoinder would be that the Roman Catholics hold aloof from thfe State school system even under present conditions. "Do you want a system in which all can join?" he asks. ",Then if you do, it will not be by the help of the Roman Catholics." Our answer is that a eystem in which all can join being apparently impossible, ft system in which all can join or refuse to join without injustico is not beyond tho range of possibility. Such a system is actually provided, by the State at the present time, and in making this provision the State has exhausted its duty, whatever the Koman Catholics or any other body may choose to do about it. But how can a denominational grant b© refused to the Roman Catholics if they are compelled to pay for a form of religious teaching which is repugnant to their consciences? And how much of the national system can remain if this principle is once recognised? Our people will therefore be wise to resist the beginnings of evil and leave things exactly as they are. The referendum and other points discussed at the meeting must be reserved for a future opportunity.