Spread of Catholic Schools

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIII, Issue 31, 3 August 1905, Page 2

Spread of Catholic Schools

For all his smoke and flame, Sir Henry Parkes was a rather small-bore politician. As a prophet, he did not receive— or deserve— much honor either in his own or in any other country. Once upon a time, at a public meeting in New South Wales, he held aloft his draft Bill on Public Instruction and declarea to a gathering that was well sprinkled with his tawny-hmed following : 1 I hold in my hand what will be death to the calling of the priesthood of the Church of Rome.' Every man is

supposed to have a germ of madness in some cell of hie brain. The amiable, beef-witted Mr. Dick, in c David Copperfield/ was mad on the subject of King Charles' head. The late Sir 'Enery's insanity was ' Popery.,' It was, with him, the ' idee fixe ' which Charcot associates with mental aberration. It lay hold of him o' nights and shook him. By day— especially in the fine fury of his electioneering outpourings to his saHron friends— he cursed it all round the compass. And he devised the present Education Act of New South Wales for the purpose of driving the hated creed beyond the southern limits of the Tropic of Capricorn. The new system took effect in the Mother Colony in 1879. But as a weapon against the Church of Rome, it has missed fire. Some days ago, in the course o£ a speech at Forest Lodge, the Cardinal-Archjbti^iop of Sidney quoted figures which show how far Sir Henry Parkes's hopes and efforts have failed of realisation. • I have,' said he, ' marked dowjn a few statistics to show that, so far as the Catholic Church is concerned, she has done her part, and has kept true to the conditions to guiOe her children in the paths of virtue, and to preserve to them the blessings of the Catholic faith. I fund that the Minister for Education, in his report on the 31st December, 1880, just 25 years ago, reported that in the Church of England the cniidren attending the Government denominational schools were 8972, and in the public schools 45,437, making in all 54,000 ' odd. At the same time the Catholic children in the Government deinomi national schools were 11,482, and in the public schools 16,345, making a total of 27,000 odd. W r ell, on the 31st December, in the year just closed (1904), we find by the same official report that the Church of England children had fallen away very much in the denominational schools— there were only 4116 children, but in the State schools 109,658, making in all 113,000 odd. On the other hand the Catholic children in denominational schools were 41,112, jind in tne State schools 20,233. This was in New South Wales alone. Well, that speaks highly for the progress of our schools in those 25 years. The Catholic children in the denominational schools have increased from 11,000 to 41,000. Whilst in the Anglican denominational schools the number has dwindled from 8900 to 4000. That shows that great progress has been made.' * Sir 'Enery is bone-dust now ; and the Church whose ' death ' he schemed in New South Wales is flourishing like the green bay-tree above his half-forgotten grave. A similar fate has fallen upon the Mndicd political mo\ement in Victoria, which (according to AttorneyGeneral Stephens) was to ' purge the 'Colony of clericalism ' and lead the young generation by sure but gradual steps to ' worship in common at the shrine of one neutral-tinted deity, sanctioned by the State Department.' Tw *lye months ago there were 32,626 children attending the Catholic schools in Victoria. And not one person in fifteen that you casually meet in that State to-day could, perhaps, immediately recall the name of Attorney-General Stephens. And his 'neutraltinted deity, sanctioned by the State Department,' has thus far failed to materialise— although the Bible-in-schools people recently made a supreme effort to give him a lecal habitation and a name.