Religious Instruction in Public Schools
THE policy of giving religious instruction in the public schools has no stronger support in any quarter than it has from Rome. Rome objects to the public schools in this country because religion is not taught in them, and demands separate schools, supported by public taxation, for Catholic pupils. The religion she desires taught in the schools is, of course, the Catholic religion. As showing Rome’s attitude on this question a Methodist journal mentions that “at the close of mass in the Catholic church at Vancouver, British Columbia, April 20, Bishop Dontenwell said that the pope had sent a message by him from Rome to ask his people to stand up for separate schools, and to have their children educated in separate schools. The statement caused much comment, owing to the heated controversy for and against government support of separate schools in northwestern Canada. The Vatican,” it adds, “is the school board controlling Roman Catholic parochial schools throughout the world. The pope will not only interfere in the school question in Canada, but he will do so in the United States. He claims that as his right.” Admit that religious instruction should be given in the schools, and the only ground of opposition to Rome that is left is the contention that the Protestant, and not the Catholic religion, is the proper religion to be taught. But assert the truly Protestant principle that no religion, either right or wrong, ought to be taught under the direction and control of the state, and Rome is at once deprived of her vantage-ground in the matter. Rome can not gain ground where the Protestant principle of the separation of church and state is maintained.