Faith Schools

The world’s religions have an enormous influence in education, involved in the running and support of more than 50% of the world’s schools. Through such schools and also via various relief and aid organizations they play an essential role in tackling female illiteracy and population issues, and providing health education and services.
In America such parochial schools, as they are usually known, are mostly Catholic, and have faced dwindling numbers and threats of closure. Why is this, because in the UK the situation is quite different? The UK 'faith schools' tend to be very popular amongst parents, not necessarily for the implied teaching of a particular faith, but for the values that they teach. Indeed our own local Anglican Church school has been turning children away for lack of space and is now busy finding that extra space to accommodate two further classes. Soon there will not be enough room in church to accommodate all the children and their parents and guardians at the regular services held for them.
As far as I can tell the value of American parochial schools is also recognized beyond simply the teaching of faith. So why do such schools struggle when in the UK their future seems so secure?
And are we dangerously brainwashing impressionable young children?
That rather depends on how the children are taught. It is vitally important to teach them from an early age about the world’s different religions, but emphasis should be placed on the many features common to them all, so that these can be appreciated and celebrated whilst helping the children to understand and respect the smaller number of differences.
I would add that most important of all is the need to nurture the spirituality within these children so that they grow in spiritual as well as religious literacy.

The loss of religion affects our moral and ethical values?

Is religion needed to support ethics and morality?

Martin Luther King saw that ‘the richer we have become materially the poorer we have become morally and spiritually.’ We live, he said, in two realms:

“The internal is that realm of spiritual ends expressed in art, literature, morals, and religion. The external is that complex of devices, techniques, mechanisms, and instrumentalities by means of which we live. Our problem today is that we have allowed the internal to become lost in the external. We have allowed the means by which we live to outdistance the ends for which we live.”

And he further warned that racial injustice, poverty and war would only be alleviated if we balance our moral progress with our scientific progress and learn the practical art of living in harmony in a ‘worldwide fellowship that lifts neighbourly concern beyond one’s tribe, race, class, and nation.’(1)

There is a three-fold morality that comes from all the great Holy teachers, from Jesus, the Buddha, from the Mosaic laws of the Old Testament, from the Upanishads, and the 8 limbs of Yoga,(2) for example. They all call for a behavioural code grounded in right conduct in thought and speech and deed. Mehta sees this three- fold morality as the “foundation for living as an integrated human being,” extolling values that distinguish the human from the sub human. If we abide by these rules there will be no inner or outer conflict in living our lives.(3)
Mehta tells the Buddhist Parable of the Saw, where the Buddha teaches his monks how to behave in the face of all the bad things that people can do to them: “Neither shall our minds be affected by this, nor for this matter shall we give vent to evil words, but we shall remain full of concern and pity, with a mind of love, and we shall not give in to hatred. On the contrary, we shall live projecting thoughts of universal love to that very person, making him as well as the whole world the object of our thoughts of universal love — thoughts that have grown great, exalted and measureless. We shall dwell radiating these thoughts which are void of hostility and ill will.” (4)
This simple morality, with nurturing, flowers into virtue, or what Mehta describes as “the transcendental ethic by which the true human lives.” (3)
I think a great fallacy within the criticisms of so many vociferous atheists and humanists is that they are fond of portraying religions in the worst light: and such comments are nowhere more adamant than around the question of ethics and morals. The critics are fond of quoting stories of awful deeds done in the name of religion, the Inquisitions and some terrorist attacks, for example. We cannot deny these. But causes are to be found in religious fanaticism and in civilizations less advanced than our own. We in Britain committed dreadful atrocities in our past history to robbers and Kings alike. Our justice system may not be perfect but it is at least now much more civilized in its treatment of wrongdoers. But a word of warning: Gandhi, on being asked what he thought of Western Civilization reputedly retorted: “It would be a good idea.”

There has to be a good reason why our “faith schools” are so very popular amongst parents for the values that they are said to teach. Our local Anglican Church school has been turning children away for lack of space and is now busy finding that extra space to accommodate two further classes. Soon there will not be enough room in church to accommodate all the children and their parents and guardians at the regular services held for them. The evidence is strong. Are so many parents likely to be very far wrong? Or are we dangerously brainwashing impressionable young children? That rather depends on how the children are taught. It is important to teach them from an early age about the world’s different religions, but emphasis should be placed on the many features common to them all, so that these can be appreciated and celebrated whilst helping the children to understand and respect the smaller number of differences. But most important of all is the need to nurture the spirituality within these children so that they grow in spiritual as well as religious literacy.

So do we need religions to support moral behaviour? In a sense the question does not matter, it is even the wrong question. The Dalai Lama writes: “whether a person is a religious believer does not matter much. Far more important is that they be a good human being.” Although he has observed that religion and ethics were once closely intertwined and warns that since the influence of religion has declined in so many lives there is ‘mounting confusion with respect to the problem of how best we are to conduct ourselves in life…morality becomes a matter of individual preference.’ (5)

To be sure, the great religious texts and teachers lay down codes of behaviour that few could argue with. We can allow these to be our teacher, our guidance, our wisdom. And the supposedly exemplary behaviour of the atheist who proclaims that he does not need religion as a code is in fact grounded in the wisdom and teachings of the great faiths, regardless of his belief in them. So rather the question should be – should we be teaching the values and virtues of the great religions and religious leaders as a basis for our behaviour in this world – the answer for any thinking person has to be a resounding “yes!” When one views the immorality in the world, an alternative secular and materialist society has not served us well.

Whatever the differences between us relating to spirituality, religion and faith, we simply do not have time to iron them all out. We need to put them to one side, curb the bickering. Instead we should be celebrating what we have in common, understanding and respecting our differences, and seeking ways to work together as human beings, with all our individual frailties, for the mutual benefit of the one beautiful and finite planet earth we all have to share.

We have a fine inheritance in our many different faiths, religions, spiritualities and ancient philosophies. They are a part of life’s rich pattern, providing a splendid tapestry of experience, wisdom and sacred texts, with so many common features to celebrate and differences to learn from. I shall consider these in future posts.

1. Martin Luther King, Nobel Peace Prize Lecture December 11 1964
2. Morality, religious observance, posture, control of Life Energy (or breath-control), withdrawal of senses from worldly objects (detachment), collectedness of mind, meditation, mental union of meditated with meditator from P.Mehta, The Heart of Religion p. 256. Morality is further defined in the Sandilya Upanishad 1.13 as harmlessness, truth, non-covetousness, continence, kindliness, equanimity, patient endurance, steadiness of mind in gain and loss, abstemiousness (especially with food and drink) and cleanliness of body and mind.
3. Mehta P. 258, 259
4. several translations are available on Internet see for example http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.021x.budd.html or http://wisdomquarterly.blogspot.com/2009/10/saw-and-other-parables.html
5. HH The Dalai Lama, Ethics for the New Millennium, (New York, 1999), p. 19. cited in Karen Armstrong, Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life The Bodley Head, (London, 2011), p. 20.

© Eleanor Stoneham 2011

Education for Spiritual Literacy

Teaching our young people in the ways of spirit and respect and love will be the world’s healing force for the future.

There is much ignorance, fear and misunderstanding to be overcome surrounding the many different world religions. In today’s world, strident God-denouncing books are widely read, whereas serious and informative religious material scarcely gets shelf room; because it fails the mantra – What is in it for the reader? And we can hold the media partly responsible for this in some very biased reporting policies, for plugging the sensational rather than the serious. We live in a quick sound-bite, low concentration, noisy, violent, opinionated world where every one looks only to his own interests; the only “spiritual” books that are read widely are those that promise personal growth and development, or success and wealth. We have entered the “Me- Millennium.”
But there is a very wide consensus amongst leading thinkers, scientists and, of course, religious leaders, that there is a crisis of spirituality, that the balance has been lost between the objective and the subjective, between the exoteric and the esoteric, between thinking and feeling; and the religious leaders themselves are not blameless in their failure to adapt to modern day spiritual needs. Education too often now concentrates only on league tables and exam results; there is too much emphasis on going on to higher education, to being able to command good jobs and high salaries, to rise to the top. And in many schools there is little time or space for spiritual nurture, for soul healing, beyond relativistic religious studies.

The Global Justice Movement describes the purpose of education as to ‘teach people how to become life-long learners and virtuous human beings, with the capacity to adapt to change, to become masters of technology and builders of civilization through their ‘leisure work,’ and to pursue the highest spiritual values.’

The Dalai Lama has stressed that education ‘constitutes one of our most powerful weapons in our quest to bring about a better, more peaceful, world.’ He emphasizes the need to open children’s eyes to the needs and rights of others, so that their actions have a universal dimension, and they develop their ‘natural feelings of empathy so that they come to have a sense of responsibility towards others.’ He reminds us that traditionally it has been assumed that ethical and human values would be taught through a child’s religious upbringing rather than in mainstream state education. With the declining influence of religion and faith in family life this vital part of a child’s education has become neglected. The Dalai Lama proffers three guidelines for the education of our children. First, he says, we need to awaken their consciousness to basic human values by showing them how these are relevant to their future survival, rather than presenting them as solely an ethical or faith issue. Then we must teach them how to discuss and debate, to understand the value of dialogue rather than violence for resolving conflict. Finally there is the urgent need to teach children that differences of race, faith, culture, while important to preserve, are nevertheless secondary to the equal rights of us all from whatever background to be happy.”

Many other respected thinkers are calling for a spiritual revolution in our schools, a move towards an education that enhances spiritual literacy.

Spirituality comes naturally to the very young. I observe this first hand in my work in an Anglican church. And there is scientific evidence that humans appear to be born with an inbuilt spiritual awareness, and that this will normally be expressed via the religious culture in which they are nurtured.

The great tragedy in my view is that this innate spirituality seems to be very often left at the school gates when children enter secondary school.

The world’s religions have an enormous influence in education. And where they are involved, and use that mandate for proper spiritual nurture and growth, rather than for any subversive activity, then all to the well and good. And of course it is the perceived indoctrination and exclusivity, for good or ill, of “religious” schools, that the atheists rail against. So let’s support the faith school, and simply ensure through parent and governor powers that they do not abuse their position of trust in developing the spiritually literate, empathic, well rounded citizens of tomorrow, that the world so needs!

References:
www.globaljusticemovement.net/home/comparisons.htm
His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Ancient Wisdom Modern World: Ethics for the New Millennium (London: Abacus, Time Warner Books UK, 2000), p.192.