THE CATHOLIC POSITION

Evening Post, Volume CXIV, Issue 91, 14 October 1932, Page 11

THE CATHOLIC POSITION

STATEMENT BY ARCHBISHOP REDWOOD

ATTITUDE UNCHANGED

His Grace Archbishop Hedwood, Archbishop of Wellington ana Metropolitan of New Zealand, has handed to . ".The Post" the following statement of the position of the Catholic' Church in regard to the Beligious Instruction in State Schools Enabling Bill now before the Legislative Council. / His Grace says :— "At this time, when some misconception is abroad as to the attitude of the Catholic Hierarchy in this country, I think it opportune tp explain to members of the Legislature and the public generally the true Catholic position ia regard to the Eeligious In&truction in State Schools Bill now before Parliament. ; "In the first place, the New Zealand Hierarchy of the Catholic Church consists of the--- Metropolitan [Archbishop Bedwood himself] and the Bishops of Christchurch, Dunedin, and Auckland (Bishops Brodie, Whyte, and Liaton respectively). . ' "When the Bible in Schools representatives met our Bishops in conference their proposals received our sympathetic consideration. They were asked to reduce their, suggested legislative programme to writing and to submit it at. a later date for the Hierarchy's, perusal and comments. When this programme was submitted to Archbishop O'Shea.l was absent from. New Zealand, and.he, without consulting the three Bishops, wrote approving the suggestions made. ' -. "The Bishops of Christchureh; Dunedia,- and Auckland were unaware that the Bible-in-Schools representatives had submitted their programme to Archbishop O'Shea. He assumed* the concurrence of our Bishops in his approval. When a.statement o£ _the . Bible-in-SchoQls Committee referring to Archbishop O'Shea's approval as that of the Catholic body appeared in the public Press, the named Bishops for the first time,knew- of Archbishop O'Shea's- approval. In turn, each of the Bishops dissociated himself publicly from concurrence. :'■'.'. : . ■'. ■- . ... - ''Later, on my return to the Dominion, I summoned-a. meeting of the Hierarchy. In a considered statement ' signed by the : four members of the Hierarchy, we addressed to the Parliamentary Committee then taking evi-' denee on last year's Bill our joint disapproval of -its contents. • ■.' "The statement was'as follows:— '" 'We -submit the: statement issued by the Hierarchy in 1925, indicating the Catholic attitude of opposition to the. then proposed Bill, pressing the point-that in the present-proposed Bill, entitled "The Religious Instruction in Public Schools Enabling Bill," there is provision for the introduction of actual religious'service. As this ia the case, patholics would automatically, by virtue of the education taxation, be forced to -contribute to a.form, of religion which they ■ cannot conscientiously accept. Moreover, the provision for the protection of the conscience of pupils and teachers is quite inadequate; the proposed conscience y clause has been thoughtless in planning; it would be cumbersome in operation and would be difficult in application.' *'.-■' " 'Viewing '•especially the unjust ■discrimination Tvhich the Bill would rJead, ipc.in .the treatment^.of dissenting. :• teachers^, -we could, under no circumstances accept. itas ; satisfactory.' i^The. statement of the Hierarchy, made in .1925, was as follows:—. ""' ".'For the second time, .the present is 1 being asked to consider a private Bill for the introduction of a measure of religion, into the- purely secular State schools of this Dominion. The Bill "in question is understood. to embody proposals agreed upon in 1923 by the leaders" of several Reformed denominations. •■•--.. " 'Itdemands,"in effect, the repeal of the fundamental secular feature of tlie Education Act of 1877, That law excludeß the knowledge and love and ser- : vice of God, and the only perfect and creative personal ideals, from the most formative processes of'a child's educational life. We entertain no doubfs as to the sincerity and the fundamentally good intentions of the promoters of these and« similar previous legislative proposals. But it is1 a matter' of wonderment and grief'to us-;.that Catholics in this Dominion lave, been left for nearly fifty years to sustainy almost alone, the real sacrifices .of a Christian primary school system. The great body of our separated brethren, clergy, and laity have all along accepted in practice the erection of legal barriers between God and' the souls of children in the' Government schools. ■ And this ■is the case even when their leaders, manifest their' discontent or alarm, not by the normal method of greatly increased religious effort and sacrifice, but chiefly by_ long-separated- spasms' of political agitation. ... -

. " ' Over and over again -we "have public- ';- 3y expressed our desire to see the State * school system "made religious, on fair • conditions all Tound, for those desiring ,it religions.'f Oyer and over again, tv-e have publicly expressed our readiness to nicet > the representatives of other Teligious bodies in conference hereon, and to give fair and friendly consideration^ any proposals for the restoration /of""religion to our State school system. We have attached only . one .condition to such a round-table con- ' .. ferehce: namely, the recognition of the .proper and equal rights; of all before the law. But our offers have been as studiously ignored in the preparation of the present Bill as they were in^the very similar measure which was heavily ; defeated by the Parliament and people ;; of' New Zealand in 1914. " 'The movement has been all along mainly a clerical one. Electoral results have already shown that,the pro- . . moters of these types of legislation have -been unable to carry with them 'the support of any notable percentage of the laity of their collective faiths. We cannot assume that this is to any considered hostility, on the part of their adherents, to the. presence of re- ■...: ligion and" its benefioent influences in - the. school. It is more reasonably accounted for by inherent defects in the several legislative proposals that have been brought forward up to the present time.. The following are the principal flawß which contributed to. the rejection of the present Bill during the last' session, and. which render it unacceptable as an attempted solution o,f the religious difficulty in the State system of public instruction. AN ESTABLISHED STATE BELIGION. .. ''.'l. Owing, presumably, to the persistence of certain old dissensions, the pro- ". moters of the present Bill stili demand that the Government shall draw up a . scheme of Scripture lessons and religious worship. These are to be derived . from a sectarian version of the Bible and from forms of devotion which are unacceptable to the consciences of considerable sections of the taxpaying community. This Bill is, in effect, an attempt to compel the Government of " this Dominion, to draw up a sectional and exclusive Established and Endowed State Eeligion for the schools. This is no part of the functions of any Government.-. : • . . CLERGY ABDICATING DUTY. " '2. We are well aware that flic pi-c-1 (rent legal facilities for religious instruc-j

tion and worship in tho State schools are seriously inadequate. Yet, rightly employed, they would admittedly be of some benefit to the souls of children. The only official returns published hereon (so far as we know) show that the Catholic clergy have taken nearly eight times more proportional advantage of those facilities (such as they are) than the clergy of. the denominations whose leaders support this Bill. Their present measure ia not in the least intended to provide increased opportunties in school for the conducting of religious instruction and worship. by clergy, or by volunteer or paid agents. On the contrary, it is, in effect, an unheroic scheme to enable the clergy of these denominations to abdicate in part one of the most sacred- duties of the Christian ministry, , and to impose it, 'by law, upon the shoulders of lay State officials or (failing them)' of school committees. PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT. " '3. On the basis of figures published during the campaign of 1911-14, the annual cost of the proposed Established State Religion would be about a quarter of a million sterling. The Bill provides no exemptions for conscientiously objecting taxpayers.' Ita promoters thus demand a compulsory contribution by all kinds of consciences to satisfy the requirements of only one kind of religious conscience. In other words, we have here a demand for exclusive preferential treatment for one only out of many, different forms of religious service; and. we have the further demand that Nonconformist taxpayers be compelled to contribute toward the cost of reducing themselves to a condition of legalised inferiority. The prol moterg of this Bill thus require unequal treatment of religious consciences and taxation without the fact or hope of benefit. . ' ... - -. TEACHERS: ILLUSORY PROTECTION. " '4.' The Bill provides a conscience clause for teachers. It enables the teacher, on paper, to object to'conducting the services of the proposed; new State^religion. -On well-known, grounds of religious faith and- discipline no Catholic teacher may in conscience take any part in these services. , A teacher's mere objection would at once throw, not upon the clergy promoters but upon the local school authorities, the duty of. providing for the worship. There^is no',need to emphasise the serious amount of moral pressure which—especially in single schools^—this illusory conscience clause' would exert upon Catholic, and other objectors to violate their convictions and sell their souls for bread and butter. ' ' '. .''■."■... ' ■ ... 's.'ln. this connection we naturally recall the frank .declarations of prominent supporters of the scheme of 1911----14 " that conscientiously objecting teachers should be driven out of the State schools.. .."..- '■"': STATE PB.OSELYTISM. " '5. The Bill also provides a conscience clause for pupils. Once again it is a notorious conscience clause devised by crafty . proselytisers for. the declared purpose of "weaning the Irish from the abuses of Popery." It compels all children to attend the service the State religion unless objecting parents go to^the trouble of making out written protests and seeing that, they reach their destination. The scandalous history of that disreputable instrument of sectarian trickery and proselytism was summarised by our. representative in hia evidence before the Education Committee of the- House of Representatives on 24th. July, 1914 (Minutes of Evidence, pp. ll;12). That odious instrument of oppression was, for very shame, long ago abandoned in Ireland. Our objection to it is vehement and based upon a Ipng experience of bitter wrong. And we/ hereby record our, soLpnin and united protest against its 'admitted and' illegal- and improper enforcement in State secondary schools of. this Dominion.; y ■ , . . ;. '.' 'A.fair conscience clause is one that would permit attendance at. worship only to'childr.en whose parents request it in writing.. Why do all the promoters of these .various schemes.of State school religion so persistently refuse to ."adoptl this reasonable kind of conscience clause?' Is it (as, is .freely alleged) that they cannot trust parents of their several faiths to apply to have their children attendthe proposed State worship? " 'For the rest it is a matter of regret to us that the scheme hereunder consideration, like its predecessors, is lacking in: the two chief elements of effective religious education—namely, definite religious instruction and the still more_vital matter of religious training. Lacking these the -present, proposals would fail to leave a, definite and lasting religious 'impression on the rising generation. PARLIAMENT:,, GUARDIAN AND TRUSTEE. ' ' 'Parliament is'the guardian and trustee of the people's/rights, including those of religion and conscience. We look with confidence to our Legislature to protect objecting cjtizens of every class,-'-- once more, from : the specified wrongs which the- Religion in State Schools Bill, would inflict upon them if-passed into law.*.

"Our attitude to-day is unchanged."