Chesterton on Goodness and Education
Before education starts, what is good must be completely certain. Giving children an education without knowing first what goodness is can only produce disaster.
October 23, 2023
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Before education starts, what is good must be completely certain. Giving children an education without knowing first what goodness is can only produce disaster.
The Word of God tells us the truth: about God, about ourselves, about time and eternity, about sin and redemption—about everything.
Although job preparation can be valuable, it is not the main focus of a Christian education. Instead, a Christian education is an education in the vocation of being Christian.
Having the wisdom and favor of the Lord is worth more than all skills, all academic degrees, all worldly knowledge. Seek to educate children as Christians…
“Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it” (Prov. 22:6)
“Do not seek how he will live a long life here, but how he will live a boundless and endless life there. Give him the great things, not the little things.”
Wanted: faithful men and women. Who will build them? The family and the Church, with Christ at their head. Will Education be a faithful maidservant, or will she destroy those entrusted to her?
What is the goal of education? Not the acquisition of Mammon. The goal of education is Fides ad Deum, Charitas ad Vicinum, faith toward God, love toward the neighbor. Or as John Chrysostom very nicely sums it up: Χριστιανὸν αὐτὸν ποίησον: Make him a Christian.
A common goal of education is to turn children into money-makers. This goal has two flaws. First, it treats the child as if he has no soul, as if this body and life are all there is. And second, it pretends that it’s acceptable, and even good, to live for oneself, to amass a pile of Mammon and be satisfied.