The completion of this building, its dedication to education, and the
opening of its doors as a Catholic parochial school are matters of
no ordinary significance in this community. By means of the present
function we are publicly emphasizing the religious character of the
educational work to be undertaken here. Due respect for the opinion
of our neighbors and fellow-citizens seems to call for some statement
from the standpoint of the Catholic laity in explanation of the reasons
which have impelled a comparatively poor congregation to incur this
great expense and to assume an obligation of future maintenance which
year after year will constitute a very serious and increasing burden.
It is indeed a striking event that a congregation, very few of whom
have large means, should have erected and equipped such a building,
costing over $150,000, and should have pledged itself to support the
school and ultimately to discharge the remaining mortgage indebtedness
of $50,000.
There is unfortunately much misunderstanding and criticism among our
fellow-citizens of other denominations in regard to the attitude of the
Roman Catholic Church towards the important and far-reaching subject
of the education of children in the public schools, and the Catholic
point of view is frequently misrepresented.
In the first place, it is constantly asserted that Catholics are
opposed to the public school system of America. On the contrary,
Catholics approve and support the public schools, and willingly vote
and pay their share of the taxes necessary for the maintenance of
these schools. They believe that the state should provide free common
schools for the education of children, so that every American child
not only shall have an opportunity of securing a free education but
may be compelled to take advantage of the opportunity thus provided.
They recognize that in this country it is generally impracticable in
the common schools to teach the tenets of religious faiths, because
to compel children indiscriminately to study the doctrines of any
particular religion in which their parents do not believe would destroy
all religious freedom and would be contrary to fundamental rights.
They recognize further that to attempt to teach in the public schools
the tenets of the Catholic, the Jewish and the numerous Protestant
denominations, would be quite impossible and inevitably would lead
to religious chaos. They realize that absolute equality or religious
freedom can be secured only by making the public schools non-sectarian.
Catholics, therefore, favor the maintenance of the system of free
common schools; they have heretofore supported and will continue to
support the system, although they object to some of the details of
management, and they will send and do send their children to these
public schools wherever there are no Catholic schools. In fact, fully
one-half of the Catholic children of our country are now attending
public schools because of the lack of Catholic schools.
Thousands of well-to-do Protestants and Jews--many in our own immediate
neighborhood--send their children to private schools, whether day or
boarding schools, in many of which the Protestant faith is taught.
Yet no one suggests that, because these parents send their children
to private schools, they are in any sense acting in hostility to the
public schools, or to American institutions, or to the best interests
of their own children. As parents, they have and ought to have the
right to send their children to such schools as they think will afford
them an education more complete and more conducive to the formation of
moral character than they can secure at the public schools. Catholics
are but exercising the same common right, and what, moreover, they
believe to be their duty as parents, when they send their children to
the parochial schools which are erected, equipped and maintained at
their own expense.
Another misrepresentation, and one which Catholics resent, is the
statement that the parochial and other Catholic schools do not
inculcate patriotism, and that they teach anti-American doctrines.
Any candid investigator will readily find that this charge is wholly
unfounded. In Catholic schools, patriotism, obedience to the law and
loyalty to the Constitution are taught as a religious even more than
a civic duty; the best and highest ideals of American patriotism and
citizenship are exalted. No true American Catholic can be other than
a good and patriotic American citizen. Children are taught in these
schools that loyal obedience to the laws and religious tolerance are
the two essential elements of good Catholic citizenship, and in every
form and aspect they are impressed with the obligation as a religious
duty to render unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar's and unto God the
things which are God's and to be ever thankful that in this country
these two separate obligations are wholly reconcilable.
The fundamental and controlling reason or motive for the establishment
and maintenance of parochial schools is the profound conviction on the
part of all Roman Catholics, in which conviction clergy and laity are
a unit, that the welfare of the state, the stability of the Union, the
continuance of civil and religious freedom, and the lasting happiness
of the individual depend upon the code and standards of morality,
discipline, self-restraint and temperance taught by religion. The
student of history well knows that social order and civilized society
have always rested upon religion; that there has never been a civilized
nation without religion; that free government has never long endured
except in countries where some religious faith has prevailed, and that
our own country for three centuries has been an essentially religious
country, by which I mean that the great majority of citizens have been
believers in God and in some Christian religion. When the Constitution
of the United States was established, the Americans were a truly
religious people, and as a whole held firmly to one form or another
of Christian faith. It has been recently pointed out by Archbishop
Ireland in the Cathedral of St. Paul that in those days, "to stay
away from religious service on Sunday was to invoke upon one's self
serious public criticism." It is quite true that the great majority of
Americans were then Protestants, but they were a religious majority.
The Catholics can never forget that they owe the blessing of the
religious liberty and tolerance which they now enjoy to a generation
that was overwhelmingly Protestant and that it was first granted at an
epoch when religious liberty and tolerance were practically unknown in
Europe, whether in Catholic or Protestant countries.
Lord Bryce in his great work on "The American Commonwealth" has
reviewed the influence of religion in this country, and has declared
that "one is startled by the thought of what might befall this huge
yet delicate fabric of laws and commerce and social institutions
were the foundation it has rested upon to crumble away." That
foundation he recognized to be religion, and he admonished us that
"the more democratic republics become, the more the masses grow
conscious of their own power, the more do they need to live, not
only by patriotism, but by reverence and self-control, and the more
essential to their well-being are those sources whence reverence
and self-control flow."[69] Catholics believe that those sources of
reverence and self-control are to be found in religion, and that if
we sow in irreligion we shall reap in irreligion. Hence the firm and
uncompromising determination of Catholic clergy and laity that thorough
and efficient religious instruction, so far as lies in their power,
shall be a vital and essential element in the education of every
American Catholic child.
I very much doubt whether any respectable number of sensible and
reflecting American citizens in our day would challenge the truth that
morality is essential to the maintenance of civilized society and
government, that the greatest influence for morality is to be found
in the churches of the various denominations throughout the country,
and that in teaching morality the churches are rendering a patriotic
service and promoting the best interests and the highest policy of
the state. I venture to assert that the only reasonable difference of
opinion possible among candid and just men is as to the best way of
inculcating religion in the young and the extent to which religious
instruction is essential as a part of the complete education of
children. On the one hand, there are those who conscientiously assert
and sincerely believe that their children can receive all the religious
training they need at home or at Sunday school and that they do not
require any religious instruction in the daily schoolroom; on the
other hand, there are those who conscientiously assert and sincerely
believe that religion is the most essential part of the education of
the child and of the forming of its moral character, that few parents
have the time or the ability to teach religion to their children, and
that religion can properly be taught only by making it part and parcel
of the early schoolroom and of every day's instruction and study, while
the mind and character of the child are plastic. The latter view is
that of Catholics and of constantly increasing numbers of Protestants
who send their children to private schools in which the doctrines of
their faith are taught.
In the Catholic view, the influence of the school upon the future
manhood and womanhood and citizenship of the country cannot be
over-estimated. The school is the nursery where the mind and heart
of the impressionable child are moulded into enduring form; the
subtle influence of daily religious surroundings, including example
and suggestion in the classroom, is as strong and pervading as it is
difficult to analyze; the lessons of the primary and elementary school
are those that endure and in time dominate the child's mind; and the
visible examples of daily discipline, uniformity of ideals, obedience,
self-control and disinterested devotedness to Church and country,
indeed the very atmosphere of the Catholic religious school, are of
themselves formative and educative elements. It is the classroom that
is the training field of character and good citizenship--of true
manhood and womanhood. Yet many would wholly exclude and banish its
most important and essential feature!
Catholics believe that religion and the philosophy of Christianity are
not to be taught haphazard, at odd moments, or by untrained persons,
and that a firm grasp of the truths of the Catholic religion--or in
fact of any religion--by the immature minds and hearts of children
cannot be secured by merely reciting abstract maxims of morality, or
without constant example and precept, daily lessons, long training and
thorough drilling. They further believe that, except in rare instances,
this cannot be done by home instruction or by attendance at Sunday
school once a week. The immense sacrifices that Catholics have made
and are making all over the country ought to demonstrate how sincere
is their conviction upon this point. We may form some idea of the
extent of this sacrifice from this building and from the fact that the
assessed valuation of the Catholic parochial schools in the city of New
York is now over $30,000,000.
The story of the heroic struggles and sacrifices of Catholics in
order to maintain their system of schools for the education of their
children ought to be known to every American Catholic, for it is the
most thrilling and inspiring page in the history of their church. The
time remaining to me will permit only a brief review of the results
accomplished. It is an accomplishment of which Catholics may justly
feel proud.
The greatest single religious fact in the United States to-day
is undoubtedly the Catholic school system maintained by private
individuals. The Catholic parish schools now number over 5,000, and
the academies and colleges over 900, with over 1,500,000 pupils in
attendance at these schools and colleges. More than 20,000 Catholic
men and women unselfishly devote their lives to the work of teaching
in these schools, academies and colleges. The system is crowned by a
great Catholic university at Washington with an attendance of nearly
1,500. This vast educational organization is maintained at a yearly
cost of millions of dollars without any public aid whatever, except the
exemption of school property from ordinary taxation. The efficiency
of the Catholic schools and colleges has long been demonstrated by
examinations and practical results, and it is at last generally
conceded. The Catholic schools teach everything that is taught in the
public schools and, in addition, they teach religion and religious
morality. The standards of education in all secular branches are equal
and in many instances superior to those of the neighborhood public
or private schools. In other words, Catholic children are as well
educated in the Catholic schools as in the public schools; they come
from them as well trained and as patriotic as the children coming
from any other schools, and in addition they are thoroughly grounded
in the doctrines of their great religion. I say "great" because it is
the great religion of all Christendom as well as of this country. When
the Constitution of the United States was framed at the Philadelphia
convention of 1787, there were only about 25,000 avowed Catholics in
the whole Union. To-day they number 17,000,000. More than one-third of
all who now attend Christian churches in the United States are Roman
Catholics. The Catholic Church has several times as many members as any
other religious denomination. The figures in the state of New York show
that about 65 per cent., nearly two-thirds, of all regular attendants
at Christian churches, are Roman Catholics, and that the remaining
attendants are divided among many separate Protestant denominations.
Hence the correctness of the assertion that the Catholic religion is
the great religion of this country.
It is true and should be added that Catholics hope that the day
will come when the people of all denominations will more adequately
appreciate the fact that religious instruction tends to promote the
best and the most loyal citizenship, that the Catholic parochial
schools are, therefore, rendering a public service, and that as such
they should be allotted a reasonable part of the public educational
fund raised from general taxation, measured by and limited to the
actual saving to that fund, provided also that a required standard
of education be maintained. In England, for example, the Catholic
parochial schools receive grants of public moneys if they fulfil
certain conditions of efficiency in secular instruction, staff
qualification and equipment, and the extent of these grants is
approximately the actual saving to the public fund. In the Catholic
diocese of Long Island, in which we live, there are now over 68,000
children being educated in the Catholic schools and colleges, and
in Greater New York there are more than 130,000 children attending
the parochial schools. All these children would have to be educated
in the public schools and at the expense of the taxpayers if the
Catholic schools did not educate them, and this Catholic education
involves an immense direct saving to the public school fund. Statistics
recently submitted to the Constitutional Convention sitting at Albany
showed that the immediate saving to the city of New York alone from
the parochial schools was fully $7,500,000 per annum, and that not
one penny of this saving was being contributed by the city or the
state to the cost of educating and training these Catholic children.
Consequently, it is not unreasonable to believe that justice and
tolerance will finally prevail, and that the day will come when it
will be recognized as equitable and as a wise and enlightened public
policy to provide that whenever any denomination, whether Catholic,
Protestant, or Jewish, is, in addition to giving religious instruction,
educating and training large numbers of children according to
satisfactory secular standards and tests, and is thereby relieving the
public educational fund, every such denominational school should be
granted out of the public funds some part of the actual saving so made,
because it is rendering a public service. A basis of adjustment will,
I am confident, be ultimately worked out, which will be fair and just
to all denominations. But in the meantime the private schools where
both secular and religious training are given to children, including
the Catholic parochial schools, must continue to be erected, equipped
and supported wholly by the members of the various denominations. There
are now numerous Protestant private schools where the Protestant faith
is being taught; and what is true of the Catholic parochial schools is
also true of the Protestant schools.
We are all so accustomed to the blessings of absolute religious
liberty that we really find it difficult to imagine that any other
condition could ever have been tolerated in the free air of America,
and we are very apt to overlook or minimize the value of the most
precious privilege we enjoy. Yet, it is only a few generations since
religious intolerance prevailed in the United States and Catholics were
mercilessly and barbarously persecuted. The first constitution of the
state of New York in 1777 discriminated against Catholics by permitting
only Protestants to become citizens of the state, and this was done
notwithstanding the fact that the Continental Congress had three years
before entreated the states to bury religious intolerance forever
in oblivion. At one time in the colony of New York Catholic priests
were hunted as criminals, were condemned to perpetual imprisonment if
apprehended, and were to suffer the death penalty if they broke prison
and were retaken. Catholics could not hold civil or military positions,
and could not even worship God according to their faith without
becoming criminals and liable to imprisonment. The only period of full
religious tolerance and liberty in our colonial history was for a short
time during the term of Governor Dongan, who was a Roman Catholic.
All this intolerance has happily passed away never to return, and
religious liberty is now firmly established. I recall the past only in
order to impress upon your minds that we should treasure this blessing
and be ever grateful to the generation of Americans, overwhelmingly
Protestant, which gave us religious freedom and in doing so went far
toward atoning for the past persecution of Catholics.
In conclusion, I must add that we Catholics of the Parish of St.
Patrick of Glen Cove should acclaim our appreciation of the great
service and unselfish devotion of the one person whose whole-hearted
energy has made this school possible and without whose example we
should despair of maintaining it. Long may this beautiful building
endure as a splendid monument to the faith and patriotism of a Catholic
priest, our beloved pastor, Bernard O'Reilly. We must also voice our
cordial welcome and pledge of support to the Sisters of Notre Dame,
worthy members of a great American Catholic sisterhood devoted to the
education of children, who are now about to take up among us the task
of teaching our children. They will labor week after week and year
after year, devotedly and unselfishly, for a pittance barely sufficient
to supply their absolute physical needs, with little or no expectation
of public recognition. They will seek and find their reward solely in
the inward satisfaction of the day's work and duty well done and in the
inspiring and quickening maxim of their order and of their whole daily
life that their holy task is ever
Pro Deo et Ecclesia et Patria.