Wiser in Their Generation by F. G.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Sep 3, 1908

“Wiser in Their Generation”

By F. G.

THE Washington Post of Sunday, July 19, quotes Cardinal Gibbons as saying, in an interview concerning the political situation just before leaving this country on a pilgrimage of devout Catholic prelates to Rome:—

I am much concerned over the political conditions of this country. There seems to be such a gradual trend toward unrighteousness in the great mass of our people that thinking men must realize that the problem must be met without delay. There is no politics without morality, there is no morality without religion, and without religion there is no God. The cardinal continued that the place to begin training future citizens is in public schools. He suggested the plan that each religious denomination maintain its own schools, the expense to be borne by the state.

This is ever the attitude of the Catholic Church. It recognizes the great value of child-training, and there is no other line of effort which is more persistently followed in its endeavor to bring about a union of church and state than the division of the public funds for educational purposes. Once the state takes this step, it has surrendered the principle of its separation from the church. Believers in the Christian faith should forever hold to the principle, recognized by the early Christians, that God lays upon them a peculiar and special duty to educate their own children in things divine. Public schools have a right and just sphere, but it is not in giving a religious education.

F. G.