STATE GRANTS TO CATHOLIC SCHOOLS

New Zealand Tablet, 17 April 1919, Page 18

STATE GRANTS TO CATHOLIC SCHOOLS

With reference to the Dunedin Evening Star’s suggested resolution for annual meetings of householders to elect school committees, and commented upon, editorially, in last week’s issue of the Tablet under the heading “Godless Education,” the following letter from the Very Rev. J. Coffey, Diocesan Administrator, appeared in the Star of Monday, April 7: Sir,- —I am sorry to notice that you are suffering from your annual attack of megalomania. I thought that the recipe which I gave you last year would have effected a permanent cure ; but evidently the disease is too deep-set. In your issue of last Wednesday you recommend a certain resolution to the householders who meet this month for the purpose of electing school committees. This resolution is not in the interest of sound education - it is not in the interest of Christianity ; it is not spoi’tsmanlike ; it is not just. It is an insult alike to the boy who wins a scholarship, but who, according to you, should be deprived of its use unless he is craven-hearted enough to turn his back on his school and his teachers, and to the boy who receives—the doubtful compliment—the prize which he has not won. For instance, this year one boy out of our school topped the list by a big margin of marks for all New Zealand in the junior scholarship examination, yet you arc sportsman enough to say that he should not get that prize. Another of our boys topped the list for all Otago in the senior national scholarships. This boy, the son of a widowed mother, is, according to you, to be deprived of his prize. Is this

in the interest of education or fair play? If he won a prize in the sports field, would you advocate that it should not be given to him because he comes from a Catholic home or goes to a Catholic school ? We hear a great deal lately of Bolshevism and Hunnism; what else are you advocating but Bolshevism and Hunnism in its worst type by your resolution? It is no wonder that minorities secretly combine and sometimes use dangerous means to attain the object they think they are justly entitled to. The “Law of the Bolo” finds its justification in the tyranny of the majority rule. If I might suggest a resolution for the meetings of householders it is this: — “That the time has arrived for the Christian people of New Zealand to combine to preserve Christianity in this fair Dominion, which must be done by keeping the schools Christian, and that Christ’s answer to Satan be given to the Atheist, the Rationalist, and non-Christians generally: * Begone, Satan the Lord thy God thou shalt adore, and Him only shalt thou serve.’ ” —I am, etc., James Coffey.

To this letter the editor of the Star attached the following footnote:

Our reply to the above is simply this: The State makes ample provision for the physical, mental, and moral training of all children. Those parents who do not wish to take advantage of this education may send their children to private or denominational schools, but they must not expect the State to pay for such schooling. As well might a taxpayer who is dissatisfied with the police protection provided, by the State employ a private watchman and expect the State to pay his salary.—Ed. N.S. In reply, Father Coffey wrote, under date April 8, to the editor of the Star as follows:

Sir, — your reply to my letter which appeared in your issue of yesterday you say “The State makes ample provision for the physical, mental, and moral training of all children,” (I might question the “moral training.” Moral training without a religious basis is impossible, but 1 shall let it pass for the present.) “Those people who require denominational schools must not expect the State to pay for them no more than a person who employs a private detective or a private watchman must expect the State to pay his salary.” Were your premises right I would agree with your conclusion. But your premises are not right and you know they are not right, therefore your conclusion is wrong. In the first place I was writing about a prize won in open competition. I was advocating the right of the boy who won the prize to use it in the way he considered gave him the best results and in a way which should be satisfactory to those who gave the prize. You limit the use of the prize and limit it in such a way as to demand the winner to give it back or become a traitor to his school and to his teachers. There is only one word in the language to describe such advocacy—Shame ! ! In the second place you conveniently forget that such a thing as conscience comes into the question, and “conscience makes cowards of us' all,” and not . a freak conscience or the conscience of a few erratic individuals, but the conscience of at least between 20 and 30 per cent, of the population, which I maintain no Government or State has the moral right to coerce. You gave one example in reply to me, let me give you another in reply to your contention. Mine, I think, will be more to the point. The Minister of Education has been going round the country lately promising all sorts of. luxuries to the dear little children of the State schools, no doubt with an eye on the coming elections. One of the luxuries promised : a a nice hot midday meal or dinner. Let us suppose that this scheme eventuates and that a nice well-cooked dinner of pork is provided but no other kind of meat. Twenty per cent, of the children attending the schools are of the Jewish faith. Will you say to those children “the State has prepared a nice satisfying meal of pork for you, good for the physical development of the body and the brain cells, and even for the moral development of the soul,” as a well-nourished child is

usually good. But the Jewish children will answer: "We cannot eat the pork no matter how good; our religion prohibits us." Will you answer these little ones: "You will have to take it, because the State provides it, or go without, or pay a double price to get the food that your religion allows you" ? For remember, Mr. Editor, that the Catholics pay their due share for the education given in the public schools "and also for the prizes given by way of scholarships. Therefore, in asking the right to hold these scholarships in their schools they are only asking what is theirs, and in getting them they are under no compliment to the State or to anybody else. — am, etc, James Coffey. St. Joseph's Cathedral, Dunedin.