As to Teaching Religion

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 6, 1908

As to Teaching Religion

In a recently published article Prof. John Dewey, of Columbia University, discusses the vexed question of teaching religion in the public schools. He finds so many practical difficulties in the way of making religion one of the subjects of instruction that his conclusions are mainly negative. Some of his inquiries run thus:—

Where are the experts in religion? And where are the authoritative teachers? There are theologians; do we want theology taught? . . . There are preachers and catechists; but, unless we are committed to some peculiar faith or institution, it is not exhortation or discipline of this sort that constitutes religious instruction. There are psychologists; but is introspection our aim? There remains, indeed, the corps of faithful, more or less well-prepared, hard-working, and hard-worked teachers. This brings us to the crux of the whole matter. Is religion a thing so specialized, so technical, so “informational” that, like geography or history or grammar, it may be taught at special hours, times, and places by those who have properly “got it up,” and been approved as persons of fit character and adequate professional training? . . . Our schools, in bringing together those of different nationalities, languages, traditions, and creeds, in assimilating them together upon the basis of what is common and public in endeavor and achievement, are performing an infinitely significant religious work. They are promoting the social unity out of which in the end genuine religious unity must grow. Shall we interfere with this work? Shall we run the risk of undoing it by introducing into education a subject which can be taught only by segregating pupils, and turning them over at special hours to separate representatives of rival faiths?

These inquiries indicate the embarrassment which is encountered in any effort to bring religion under the direction of the state. The one answer to all these inquiries is that the teaching of religion is not a matter which can be properly under state control or conducted at public expense.