RELIGIOUS KNOWLEDGE OF MOST WORTH
The child comes into the world devoid of all knowledge and
understanding. His mind, though at the beginning a blank, is a potential
seedbed in which we may plant what teachings we will. The babe born into
our home to-day can with equal ease be made into a Christian, a
Buddhist, or a Mohammedan. He brings with him the instinct to respond to
the appeal religion makes to his life, but the kind and quality of his
religion will depend largely on the religious atmosphere he breathes and
the religious ideas and concepts placed in his mind through instruction
and training.
What, then, shall we teach our children, in religion? If fruitful
knowledge is to be one of the chief aims of our teaching, _what_
knowledge shall we call fruitful? What are the great foundations on
which a Christian life must rest? Years ago Spencer wrote a brilliant
essay on _knowledge of most worth_ in the field of general education.
What knowledge is of most worth in the field of religious education? For
not all knowledge, as we have seen, is of equal value. Some religious
knowledge is fruitful because it _can be set at work_ to shape our
attitudes and guide our acts; other religious knowledge is relatively
fruitless because it _finds no point of contact_ with experience.
To answer our question we must therefore ask: "What knowledge will serve
to guide the child's foot-steps aright from day to day as he passes
through his childhood? What truths will even now, while he is still a
child, awaken his spiritual appreciation and touch the springs of his
emotional response to the heavenly Father? What religious concepts, once
developed, will lead the youth into a rich fullness of personal
experience and develop in him the will and capacity to serve others?
What religious knowledge will finally make most certain a life of
loyalty to the church and the great cause for which it stands?" When we
can answer these questions we shall then be able to say what knowledge
is of most worth in the religious training of our children.
THE CHILD'S CONCEPT OF GOD
The child must come to know about God, even as a little child. Long
before he can understand about _religion_, he can learn about a heavenly
Father. This does not imply that the child (or that we ourselves!) can
know God in any full or complete way. Indeed, a God who could be known
in his entirety by even the deepest and wisest finite mind would be no
God at all. Yet everyone must give some meaning to God. Everyone does
have some more or less definite idea, image, or mental picture of the
God he thinks about, prays to, and worships.
The child's idea of God develops gradually.--We need not be concerned
that God does not mean the same to the child with his mental limitations
that he means to us. Meaning comes only out of experience, and this will
grow. The great thing is that the child's fundamental concept of God
shall start right, that in so far as it goes it shall be essentially
true, and that it shall be clear and definite enough to guide his
actions. More than this we cannot ask for; less than this does not give
the child a God real enough to be a vital factor and an active force in
his life.
It is to be expected, then, that the child's earliest concepts of God
will be faulty and incomplete, and that in many points they will later
need correction. Probably most children first think of God as having
human form and attributes; the idea of spirit is beyond their grasp. God
is to them a kind of magnified and glorified Father after the type of
their earthly father. This need not concern us if we make sure that the
crude beginnings of the God-idea have no disturbing elements in them,
and that as the concept grows it moves in the right direction.
The harm from false concepts.--Mr. H.G. Wells[2] bitterly complains
against the wrong concept of God that was allowed to grow in his mind as
a child. These are his words: "He and his hell were the nightmare of my
childhood.... I thought of him as a fantastic monster perpetually
waiting to condemn and to strike me dead!... He was over me and about my
silliness and forgetfulness as the sky and sea would be about a child
drowning in mid-Atlantic." It was only as the child grew into youth, and
was able to discard this false idea of God that he came to feel right
toward him.
[2] God the Invisible King, p. 44.
The harm done a child by false and disturbing concepts of God is hard to
estimate. A small boy recently came home from Sunday school and confided
to his mother that he "didn't think it was fair for God to spy on a
fellow!" A sympathetic inquiry by the mother revealed the fact that the
impression brought from the lesson hour was of God keeping a lookout for
our wrongdoings and sins, and constantly making a record of them against
us, as an unsympathetic teacher might in school. The beneficent and
watchful oversight and care of God had not entered into the concept.
It is clear that with this wrong understanding of God's relation to him
the child's attitude and the response of his heart toward God could not
be right. The lesson hour which left so false an impression of God in
the child's mind did him lasting injury instead of good.
How wrong concepts may arise.--Pierre Loti tells in his reminiscences
of his own child-life how he went out into the back yard and threw
stones at God because it had rained and spoiled the picnic day. In his
teaching, God had been made responsible for the weather, and the boy had
come to look upon prayer as a means of getting what he wanted from God.
It took many years of experience to rid the child's mind of the last
vestiges of these false ideas. The writer recalls a troublesome idea of
God that inadvertently secured lodgment in his own mind through the
medium of a picture in his first geography. In the section on China was
the representation of a horrid, malignant looking idol underneath which
was printed the words, "A God." For many years the image of this picture
was associated with the thought of God, and made it hard to respond to
the concept of God's beauty, goodness, and kindness.
Wrong concepts of God may leave positive antagonisms which require years
to overcome. A little girl of nearly four years had just lost her
father. She did not understand the funeral and the flowers and the
burial. She came to her mother in the evening and asked where her papa
was. The stricken mother replied that "God had taken him."
"But when is he coming back?" asked the child.
The mother answered that he could not come back.
"Not ever?" persisted the child.
"Not ever," whispered the mother.
"Won't God let him?" asked the relentless questioner.
The heart-broken mother hesitated for a word of wisdom, but finally
answered, "No, God will not let him come back to us."
Care and wisdom needed.--And in that moment the harm was done. The
child had formed a wrong concept of God as one who would willfully take
away her father and not let him return. She burst out in a fit of
passion: "I don't like God! He takes my papa and keeps him away."
That night she refused to say her prayer, and for weeks remained
rebellious and unforgiving toward the God whom she accused of having
robbed her of her father. How should the mother have answered her
child's question? I cannot tell in just what words, but the words in
which we answer the child's questions must be chosen with such infinite
care and wisdom that bitterness shall not take the place which love
toward God should occupy in the heart.
Another typical difficulty is that children are often led to think of
God as a distant God. A favorite Sunday school hymn sings of "God above
the great blue sky." To many children God is "in heaven," and heaven is
localized at an immeasurable distance. Hence the fact of God's nearness
is wholly missed. Children come to think of God as seated on a great
white throne, an aged, austere, and severe Person, more an object of
fear than of love. And then we tell the children that they "must love
God," forgetting that love never comes from a sense of duty or
compulsion, but springs, when it appears, spontaneously from the heart
because it is compelled by lovable traits and appealing qualities in the
one to be loved!
The concept of God which the child needs.--The concept of God which
the child first needs, therefore, is God as loving Father, expecting
obedience and trust from his children; God as inviting Friend; God as
friendly Protector; God ever near at hand; God who can understand and
sympathize with children and enter into their joys and sorrows; God as
Creator, in the sunshine and the flowers; but above all, God filling the
heart with love and gladness. The concept which the child needs of Jesus
is of his surpassing goodness, his unselfish courage, and his loving
service. All religious teaching which will lead to such concepts as
these is grounding the child in knowledge that is rich and fruitful, for
it is making God and Christ _real_ to him. All teaching which leads to
false concepts is an obstacle in the way of spiritual development.
THE CHILD'S CONCEPT OF RELIGION
Gradually throughout his training the child should be forming a clear
concept of religion and the part it is to play in the life. This cannot
come through any formal definition, nor through any set of precepts. It
must be a growth, stimulated by instruction, guided by wise counsel,
given depth of meaning through the lives of strong men and women who
express the Christian ideal in their daily living.
Matthew Arnold tells us that religion is "morality lit up by emotion."
We turn to God for our inspiration, for the quickening of our motives,
for fellowship, communion and comfort; but it is when we face the duties
and relationships of the day's work and its play that we prove how close
we have been to God and what we have received from him. As there can be
no religion without God, neither can there be religion without morality;
that is, without righteous living.
Connecting religion with life.--One of the chief aims in teaching the
child religion should therefore be to ground him in the understanding
that _religion is life_. Probably no greater defect exists in our
religion to-day than our constant tendency to divorce it from life.
There are many persons who undertake to divide their lives up into
compartments, one for business, one for the relations of the home, one
for social matters, one for recreation and amusement, and _one for
religion_. They make the mistake of assuming that they can keep these
sections of the life separate and distinct from each other, forgetting
that life is a unity and that the quality of each of its aspects
inevitably colors and gives tone to all the rest.
The child should be saved the comfortable assumption so tragically
prevalent that religion is chiefly a matter for Sundays; that it
consists largely in belonging to the church and attending its services;
that it finds its complete and most effective expression in the
observance of certain rites and ceremonials; that we can serve God
without serving our fellow men; that creeds are more important than
deeds; that saying "Lord, Lord," can take the place of a ministry of
service.
Religion defined in noble living.--There is only one way to save the
child from such crippling concepts as these: that is to hold up to him
the challenge of _life at its best and noblest_, to show him the effects
of _religion at work_. What are the qualities we most admire in others?
What are the secrets of the influence, power, and success of the great
men and women whose names rule the pages of history? What are the
attributes that will draw people to us as friends and followers and give
us power to lead them to better ways? What are the things that will
yield the most satisfaction, and that are most worth while to seek and
achieve as the outcome of our own lives? What is true success, and how
shall we know when we have achieved it? _Why does the Christ, living his
brief, modest, and uneventful life and dying an obscure and tragic
death, stand out as the supreme model and example for men to pattern
their lives by?_
These are questions that the child needs to have answered, not in formal
statements, of course, but in terms that will reach his understanding
and appreciation. These are truths that he needs to have lodged in his
mind, so that they may stir his imagination, fire his ambition, and
harden his will for endeavor. These are the goals that the child needs
to have set before him as the measure of success in life, the pathways
into which his feet should be directed.
The qualities religion puts into the life.--What, then, are the things
men live by? What are the great qualities which have ruled the finest
lives the world has known? How does religion express itself in the run
of the day's experience? What are some of the objective standards by
which religion is to be measured in our own lives or in the lives of
others, in the lives of children or in the lives of adults? What are the
characterizing features in the life and personality of Jesus? What did
he put first in practice as well as in precept?
_Joyousness._ No word was oftener on the lips of Jesus than the word
"joy," and the world has never seen such another apostle of joyousness.
The life that lacks joy is flat for him who lives it, and exerts little
appeal to others.
_Good will._ The good will of Jesus embraces all manner and conditions
of people. His magnanimity and generosity under all conditions were one
of the charms of his personality and one of the chief sources of his
strength.
_Service._ Jesus's life was, if possible, more wonderful than his death,
and nothing in his life was more wonderful than his passion for serving
others. The men and women whom the world has remembered and honored in
all generations and among all peoples are the men and women who found
their greatness in service.
_Loyalty._ Steadfastness to the cause he had espoused led Jesus to the
cross. Great characters do not ask what road is easy, but what way is
right. Where duty leads, the strong do not falter nor fail, cost what it
may. They see their task through to the end, though it mean that they
die.
_Sympathy._ Jesus always understood. His heart had eyes to see another's
need. His love was as broad as the hunger of the human heart for
comradeship. We are never so much our best selves as when self is
forgotten, and we enter into the joys or the sorrows of one who needs
us.
_Purity._ Sin has its price for all it gives us. We cannot stain our
souls and find them white again. We later reap whatever now we sow.
Jesus's life of righteousness, lived amid temptations such as we all
meet, is a challenge to every man who would be the captain of his own
soul.
_Sincerity._ No man ever doubted that Jesus meant what he said. No man
ever accused him of acting a part. His enemies, even, never found him
misrepresenting or speaking other than the truth. All truly fine
characters can be trusted for utter sincerity of word, of purpose, and
of deed.
_Courage._ Jesus was never more sublime than under conditions that test
men's courage. Did he face hostile mob and servile judge? did he find
himself misunderstood and deserted by those who had been his friends?
must he bid his disciples a last farewell? did he see the shadow of the
cross over his pathway?--yet he never faltered. His courage stood all
tests.
_Vision._ A distinguishing quality of the great is their power to put
first things first. Jesus possessed a fine sense of values. He willingly
sold all he had that he might buy the pearl of great price. His
temptations to follow after lesser values left him unscathed, and he
refused to command the stones to be made bread, or to do aught else that
would turn him from his mission.
_God-Consciousness._ Those who have most left their impress upon the
world and the hearts of men have not worked through their own power
alone. They have known how to link their lives to the infinite Source of
power; the way has been open between their lives and God. Jesus never
for a moment doubted that all the resources of God were at his command,
hence he had but to reach out and they were his.
* * * * *
It is evident, as before stated, that this functional definition of
religion, this great program of living, cannot be thrust on the child
all at once--cannot be _thrust_ on him at all. But day after day and
year after year throughout the period of his training the conviction
should be taking shape in the child's mind that these are the _real_
things of life, the truest measure of successful living, the highest
goals for which men can strive. The definition of religion which he
forms from his instruction should be broad enough to include these
values and such others of similar kind as Christianity at its best
demands.
KNOWLEDGE OF THE BIBLE
A knowledge of the essential parts of the _Bible_ is indispensable to
Christian culture. The Bible is the storehouse of spiritual wisdom of
the ages, the matchless textbook of religion. Great men and women of all
generations testify to its power as a source of inspiration and
guidance. To be ignorant of its fundamental spiritual truths is to lack
one of the chiefest instruments of religious growth and development. Not
to know its teachings is to miss the strongest and best foundation that
has ever been laid for fruitful and happy living. To lose a knowledge of
the Bible out of our lives is to deprive ourselves of the ethical and
religious help needed to redeem society and bring the individual to his
rightful destiny. Yet this generation is confronted by a widespread and
universal ignorance of the Bible, even among the adherents of the
churches.
Making the Bible useful to the child. The child cannot be taught all
of the Bible as a child. Indeed, parts of if dealing with the ideals and
practices of peoples and times whose primitive standards were far below
those of our own times are wholly unsuited to the mind of childhood, and
should be left until maturity has given the mental perspective by which
to interpret them. Other parts of the Bible prove dry and uninteresting
to children, and are of no immediate spiritual significance to them.
Still other parts, which later will be full of precious meaning, are
beyond the grasp or need of the child in his early years and should be
left for a later period. But with all these subtractions there still
remains a rich storehouse of biblical material suited for all ages from
earliest childhood to maturity. This material should be assembled and
arranged in a _children's Bible_. This abridged Bible should then be
made a part of the mental and spiritual possession of every child.
The knowledge of the Bible which will be of most worth to the child must
be a _functioning_ knowledge; a knowledge that can and will be put at
work in the child's thought, helping him form his judgments of right and
wrong and arrive at a true sense of moral values; a knowledge that stirs
the soul's response to the appeal God makes to the life; a knowledge
that daily serves as a guide to action amid the perplexities and
temptations that are met; a knowledge that lives and grows as the years
pass by, constantly revealing deeper meanings and more significant
truths.
The test of useful knowledge.--This is all to say that the knowledge
of the Bible given the child must in no sense be a merely formal
knowledge, a knowledge of so many curious or even interesting facts
separated from their vital meaning and application. It must not consist
of truths which for the most part _do not influence thought and action_.
Not how many facts are lodged in the mind, nor how many have passed
through the mind and been forgotten, but _how many truths are daily
being built into character_--this measures the value of the knowledge we
teach the child from the Bible.
KNOWLEDGE ABOUT THE CHURCH
The church represents religion organized. Because of our social impulses
we need to worship together in groups. Many religious activities, such
as education, evangelism, missionary enterprises, and reforms, can be
successfully carried out only by joint action; hence we have the church,
a _means of religious culture_, and the _instrument of religious
service_. Few there are who, outside the church, maintain their own
religious experience or carry the ministry of religious service to
others. A knowledge of the church is therefore an essential part of the
child's religious education.
What the child needs to know about the church.--This does not mean
that the child needs to know the technical and detailed history of the
Christian Church; this may come later. Nor does it mean that the child
needs to know the different theological controversies through which the
church has passed and the creeds that have resulted; this also may come
later. What the child needs first to know is that the church is the
instrument of religion, the home of religious people; that the Christian
Church began with the followers of Jesus, and that it has existed ever
since; that it has done and is doing much good in the world; that the
best and noblest men and women of each generation work with and through
the church; that the church is worthy of our deepest love and
appreciation, and that it should command our fullest loyalty and
support.
Besides this rather general knowledge of the church, the child should
know the organization and workings of the present-day church. He should
come to know as much of its program, plans, and ideals as his age and
understanding will permit.
Even the younger children are able to understand and sympathize with the
missionary work of the church, both in home and in foreign lands.
Missionary instruction offers a valuable opportunity to quicken the
religious imagination and broaden the social interests. Lessons showing
the church at work in missionary fields should therefore be freely
brought to the child.
Knowledge of the church's achievements.--The part the church has taken
and is to-day taking in advancing the cause of education will appeal to
the child's admiration and respect. A knowledge of its philanthropies
will make a good foundation for the later loyalties to be developed
toward the church as an institution. The important influence of the
church in furthering moral reforms and social progress is well within
the appreciation of adolescents, and should be brought to their
recognition.
Especially should children know the activities of their own local
church; they should learn of its different organizations and of the work
each is doing; they should know its financial program--where the money
comes from and the uses to which it is put; they should know its plans
ahead in so far as their participation can be used in carrying out its
activities. All these lines of information are necessary to the child in
order that his interest and loyalty may have an intelligent and enduring
basis.
Knowledge of one's own church.--The first knowledge of the church as
an institution given the child should be of the _church as a whole_, and
should have no denominational bias. We should first aim to make out of
our children _Christians_, and only later to make out of them
Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, or Congregationalists.
There comes a time, however, when the child should become informed
concerning his own particular church or denomination. He should learn of
its history, its achievements, its creeds, its plan of organization and
polity. This is not with the purpose of cultivating a narrow
sectarianism, but in the interests of a self-respecting intelligence
concerning the particular branch of the church which is one's spiritual
home. That the great mass of our people to-day possess any reasonable
fund of knowledge about the Christian Church or their own denomination
may well be doubted. This is a serious fault in religious education.
KNOWLEDGE OF RELIGIOUS MUSIC AND ART
Not all of the child's religious impressions come through direct
instruction in the facts and precepts of religion. Religious feeling and
comprehension of the deeper meanings and values often best spring from
their expression in music and art.
Music essential to religion.--No other form of expression can take the
place of music in creating a spirit of reverence and devotion, or in
inspiring religious feeling. So closely is music interwoven with
religion that no small part of the world's greatest musical masterpieces
have a religious motive as their theme. Even among primitive peoples
music is an important feature of religious ceremonials. The Christian
Church has a large and growing body of inspiring hymnology.
The child needs to be led into a knowledge of religious music. He needs
this knowledge as a stimulus and a means of expression for his own
spiritual life. But he also needs it in order to take part in the
exercises of his church and its organizations. He needs it in order to
enjoy music and do his part in producing it in the home and the school.
This means that children should come to know the hymnology of the
church; they should know the words and the music of such worthy and
inspiring hymns as are adapted to their age and understanding. They
should finally, during the course of their development to adulthood,
learn to know and enjoy the great religious oratorios and other forms of
musical expression.
The place of art in religion.--Art, like music, owes much of its
finest form and development to religion. Religious hope, aspiration,
and devotion have always sought expression in pictorial or plastic art
and in noble architecture. We owe it to our children to put them in
possession of this rich spiritual heritage. They should know and love
the great masterpieces of painting dealing with religious themes. They
should not only have these as a part of their instruction in the church
school classes, but they should also have them in their homes and in
their schools, and see them in public art galleries and in other public
buildings suitable for their display.
Wherever possible the church building should in its architecture express
in a worthy way the religious ideals of its members. It should first of
all be adapted to the uses expected of it. It should be beautiful in
conception and execution, and should allow no unlovely or unworthy
elements to enter into its structure.
We should teach our children something of the wonder and beauty of
religious architecture as represented in the great cathedrals and
churches of all lands, and lead them to see in these creations the
desire and attempt of great souls to express their appreciation for
God's goodness to men.
1. It will help you to understand the child's idea of God if you
will think back to your own childhood and answer the following
questions: Just who and what was God to you? Was he near by or far
off? When you prayed, to what kind of a Being was the prayer
addressed? Did Jesus seem more near and friendly to you than God?
What were (or are) the most outstanding attributes of God's nature
to you? Did you ever have any disturbing ideas about God?
2. Now, suppose you attempt to answer these same questions about
the children in your class. You will have to remember that the
child may not be able to explain just what God seems to
him--perhaps you can hardly do this yourself. Further, a child may
often have some notion that what he feels is queer or would not be
well received, and hence he will not fully express it to others.
3. Just what does religion seem to you to be? Is it largely a way
of living or a set of conventions and restraints? How did religion
appeal to you in your childhood? Are you able to tell how the
children of your class understand religion? What definite help are
you giving them toward broadening and enriching their concept of
religion? Are you leading them to see that religion is a way of
living the day's life?
4. To what extent do you feel that you really know the Bible? Could
you give a sketch of twenty of its leading characters, describing
the strengths and weaknesses of character of each? Could you
describe the great biblical events, and draw the lessons they
teach? Could you compare and characterize the Hebrew religion and
the religion of Jesus? Are the pupils in your class going to be
able from the work of the church school to answer favorably these
and similar questions?
5. We expect good citizens to know something of the history of
their country and their commonwealth. Is it too much to ask members
of the Christian Church to have the same information about the
church? Could you pass a fair examination on the history and
achievements of the church? Of your own particular church? Are the
children of your church school growing in this knowledge? The
children of your class?
6. To what extent do the children of your class know the hymns of
the church? Is care taken to give them such hymns as are suited to
their age? Are worthy hymns taught them, or the silly rimes found
in many church song books? (This does not mean that children should
be taught music beyond their comprehension; there is much good
music suited to different ages.) Are your children having an
opportunity to know the great religious pictures? Religious
architecture? (Here also the work must be adapted to the age.)
FOR FURTHER READING
Coe, Education in Religion and Morals.
Brown, The Modern Man's Religion, chapter on "The Use of the Bible."
Fosdick, The Manhood of the Master.
Weld and Conant, Songs for Little People.
Bailey, The Gospel in Art.