THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 93, 14 December 1912, Page 5

THE BIBLE IN SCHOOLS.

BISHOP CLEARY’S VIEWS

(Per Press Association.)

Wellington, December 13

At a public meeting to-night Bishop. Cleary dealt in detail with seven alterations in the existing law for which he said the Bible in Schools League were agitating. He quoted the texts of various laws to show that Biblical and general religious teaching formed part and parcel of the regular school curriculum in various Australian States, and demonstrated that religious instruction is there imparted by the State through State servants as a regular class subject of the State schools. The League demanded in effect that the Education Act should l)e free, compulsory, and narrowly sectarian, suited only for one group of consciences. Details were also given as to the cost of religious teaching, for which conscientious objectors would be compelled to pay tithes in the shape of taxes. Catholic teachers could not accept the dogmatic principle of private judgment, and the discipline of their church prohibited them from reading or explaining versions of the Scriptures not approved by their spiritual authority. The teachers were to be denied the rights of conscience which were accorded to the worst criminals in gaols. The Bishop dealt with the seven proposed changes in the law seriatim, and challenged each one. At the conclusion of the Bishop’s address, Mr. T. M. Wilford moved, and Mr. J. Hutcheson seconded, the following resolution: “That as citizens and taxpayers of this Dominion we pledge ourselves to oppose the scheme of the Bible in State Schools’ League as an invasion of the rights of conscience an inimical to the real interest of religion and religious peace.” This was carried practically unanimously by the 2500 people present.