A school offering a good and true education will answer the question “What is truth?” in the words that Christ gave to His disciples when He told them that He is “the way, the truth, and the life.” An education that sidelines Christ or ignores Him, or which treats Christianity as only one of several equally valid religions, is not a true education at all.
As the new school year gets under way, it’s a good time to be thinking about the quality of education that our children are getting, or in all too many cases the education that they are not getting.
The first test of what constitutes a good education is the way that one of the most important questions is asked and answered. It is Pilate’s famous question to Christ: Quid est veritas? What is truth? If the asking of this question is not at the heart of a school’s curriculum, it is not a school offering a true education. If, on the other hand, the question is asked but only with the tired indifference of the relativist who believes that it is a question that is unanswerable, the school is likewise failing to offer an authentic education. The question needs to be asked as one that needs to be answered and, furthermore, as one to which the answer is ultimately knowable and known.
As for the answer to the question, a school offering a good and true education will answer it in the words that Christ gave to His disciples when He told them that He is “the way, the truth, and the life.” The way to truth can only come through Christ, which means that it can only come with an understanding of the Gospel and the teaching of the Magisterium of the Catholic Church, which is nothing less than the Mystical Body of Christ in the world. An education that sidelines Christ or ignores Him, or which treats Christianity as only one of several equally valid religions, is not a true education at all. How can it be? In denying Christ, it denies the way, the truth, and the life, without which, or whom, there is nothing ultimately but darkness.
Having established the centrality of Christ to all authentic education, the other essential element of a true education is an acceptance of the unbreakable bond between fides et ratio, the indissoluble marriage of faith and reason, which is at the heart of true Christian philosophy. At the heart of this rational path to truth is a proper understanding of “science.” The word science comes from the Latin word scientia, which simply means knowledge. It is for this reason that the Church has always taught that theology is the queen of the sciences. Theology is the knowledge of God, the first and most important of all the sciences. Another science that is often neglected is philosophy which is the knowledge of reality to be discovered in the love of wisdom. It is the science of wisdom. History is the knowledge of reality to be discovered by understanding the past. It is the science of the past, or, to put it another way, it is the science of human experience. If an education is neglecting these crucial and authentic paths of knowledge in favour of the so-called “hard” sciences, the latter of which are encapsulated in the so-called STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), it is not an authentic or adequate education. These subjects are important, of course, but only as part of a wider knowledge, which includes the other sciences.
Last, but emphatically not least (indeed the last shall be first!), a good and true education must be an education that teaches what it means to be good. It must teach virtue, and it must teach the Christian understanding of love, the very heart of all virtue, which is the conscious choosing of the sacrifice of the self for others. Such an education, which teaches the good and the true, can be said to be truly beautiful.
This essay was first published in Legatus Magazine and is republished with permission.
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Editor’s Note: The featured image is “Allegory of Teaching” by Juriaen Jacobsze (1624-c. 1685), courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Agreed. But like most writers on education Joseph, you ignore primary school (age 4 – 11) years. Perhaps you think they are insignificant? But in the context of which you write – the Truth, the Way, the Life and leading a virtuous existential life, they are the vital foundation of the later high school years.
My grandfather was an educator, a principal of a Manchester by the Sea Public School. His belief in God was the force that guided him. He would have enjoyed and agreed with this writing.
I have been thinking about the word, education, especially in the context of public schools. It sure becomes a very complex subject especially when it becomes a topic when many students fail to make the grade for advancement. For decades now, the only solution to the problem that is presented to the voting public is more money for the children! Money! Raise taxes…it’s for the children, after all…
Learning is very difficult for many and, for me, it is the first word that came to mind. When one of my sons was in fourth grade, I was totally surprised at his first parent teacher conference when his teacher asked me how is it that he is in fourth grade and not reading at fourth grade level? Shock. Had him tested by a private psychologist, did not trust the school for an adequate evaluation. The psychologist was shocked that I came to him. The outcome of his evaluation was that my son was at genius IQ level, and that usually it isn’t until high school that he sees the parents and the child when everyone is fighting! Turns out, he had an audio problem, easily distracted by poor acoustics of a classroom, making understanding oral instructions almost impossible. This is hardly a rare condition, not much can be done in that atmosphere, and that kind of child is the one who falls through the cracks, as they say!
Also, had grandchildren with not easily observable learning difficulties. My experiences with all this is the public schools are not much help. All the money put into public education would not have solved anything. I have left out much detail…this is not the forum for all that. Young children, let alone older ones, are often too embarrassed to raise their hand in front of their peers to confess they don’t understand. Nor do they reach out for help because they don’t know their problem.
Pilate’s question of what is truth is surly one of importance, especially within the context of the Biblical account. But, I think that Jesus posed the best question of all when he asked his disciples, “who do men say that I am” ? …which leads to the final question He asks of everyone , “who do you say that I am” ? Is truth just left to be one’s opinion? Good question!
The answer is classical education. The model comprises pedagogical divisions according to developmental stages of children: grammar is the designation for k-6, when children soak up knowledge and memorization is a joy; 6-8 the dialectal or logic phase, when older children learn to begin to differentiate the why and begin to reason; and the rhetoric phase, when teens/soon-to-be-young adults create forms drawn the body of knowledge acquired in grammar school and the testing of the waters of reason. Classical education is an antidote to the progressive drone in education that depletes and then kills the mind and soul, to subjugate to drudgery.
Agreed.
Now then, did any of you vote in your last school board election?
I did, and it was a lonely experience, as it always is.