Instruction in Religion RICHARD MORSE HODGE, D. D. Teachers College, Columbia University, New York How Shall Instruction in Religion be Divided Among the Different Institutions Which Appear to be Responsible for Giving to Children and Youth Their Religious Inheritance? I. A child is entitled to his scientific, literary, aesthetic, institutional and religious inheritance. 2. Education is "a gradual adjustment to the spiritual possessions of the race." Formal instruction is one of the means of education. 3. Religion is the complete social life of God and humanity in one fellowship, with humanity in loving and reverent dependence upon God. Morality is efficient service in the social life of humanity, with an ideal society as the ultimate aim. 4. Moral instruction may be pursued by itself or as an integral part of religion. In either case it is contributary to religious culture. Worship itself can be taught only after exciting an admiration of the qualities for which God is adorable. 5. Moral and religious instruction alike should kindle emotions, which favor virtue and disfavor vice and promote aspiration for the realization of a social ideal. 6. Religious instruction should appeal to the authority of the religious consciousness and experience of the class and its members and of other social groups and individuals and to the character and will of God, which, for the Christian, have been revealed completely by Jesus. Moral instruction should appeal to the authority of the conscience and experience of the class and its members and of other social groups and individuals. 7. The American system of education demands that instruction in religion shall not be given in the school. It permits moral instruction in the school, and religious, and even sectarian, instruction in the Sunday school and home. 8. The school (a) may give courses in ethics. Ethical selections from the Bible are permissible for material for this purpose, provided that they are printed in a volume by themselves or with similar selections from other literatures. (b) Ethical judgments will be formed and ethical feeling can be powerfully exercised in the study of science, literature, history and art. (c) School life, through school administration and habits cultivated at school, can be made morally educative in a high degree. (d) The school should acquaint its pupils with how its teaching is supplemented by that of the Sunday school. 9. The Sunday school (a) should teach religion in terms of divine purpose, religious ideas, personal character and social achievement, as expressed in the faith, worship, literature, art and institutions of religion and their spread in the past, and as demanding fuller expression in the present and future. (b) The worship, religious ideas to be taught, ethical problems to solve, ethical activities to be directed and the subject-matter of instruction, should be carefully graded, according to the spiritual and intellectual capacities of pupils of different ages. (c) Pupils should be taught how the education provided in the Sunday school is related to that which they obtain in the home, school and elsewhere. (d) The methods of teaching employed should be in accordance with the findings of psychological and pedagogical science. (e) Sunday-school teachers should be of superior character and ability and as thoroughly trained as possible in a knowledge of children's needs, capacities and responsibilities and how to meet them, of religion itself, the subject-matter of instruction and pedagogical methods of teaching. They should be under expert direction and supervision. They should be paid for their services when in no other way superior instructions can be secured for the Sunday school. (f) The Sunday-school session should be of not less than two and one-half hours a week. This is the general practice of Jewish Sunday schools. (g) Building and educational apparatus should be as adequate for the purposes of teaching as the provisions made for public schools. (h) Two or more Sunday schools should combine when necessary to obtain an adequate building for their use and secure expert instruction. 10. Theological schools (a) should train a ministry, which shall be as expert in educational science as in religion. (b) They should furnish courses of instruction and practice school for the training of Sunday-school teachers. II. The home (a) should supply whatever education in morals and religion may be necessary for its children, in addition to what may be provided by local schools and churches. (b) In some cases special teachers may supplement in the home the instruction given by parents. 12. The instruction in morality and religion now provided by schools and churches is generally inadequate, and largely because the present generation of parents have not themselves received enough of their religious inheritance properly to estimate its value for their children. Prompt and vigorous action is necessary on the part of educators lest the rising generation shall fail, when they become parents, to appreciate their responsibility of securing for their children a proper education in religion. Sunday School Curricula Outlines The outlines below represent almost every type of school as to size, equipment and opportunities. Without exception, each curriculum is in actual use; some of them are the results of years of experiment and study, and have demonstrated their value and practicability by use over a long period. These are only a few among the many graded curricula in use. It is a matter of regret that it is not possible to publish with each outline a statement of its underlying philosophy; usually, however, a careful examination will indicate the educational plan of each one. It is suggested that inquiries regarding these curricula be sent to the office of the Religious Education Association, in order to relieve the schools of the burden of correspondence. Other outline courses are published at pp. 110-119 of the volume, THE MATERIALS OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. The Association will be pleased to receive further outlines. Diciples School At the Church of the Diciples in Boston, Massachusetts CLARA BANCROFT BEATLEY The Disciples School occupies large, sunny, well-ventilated rooms in the new Church of the Disciples. The lower room, the library, is used for assembly and for the religious services of the school. The upper rooms are attractively furnished for classrooms. The kindergarten and primary classes meet at eleven o'clock in a large upper room, full of light and surroundings of cheer. The teachers welcome the children in the reception room at ten minutes before eleven. The main school assembles at quarter before ten, that the young people may join their parents for church service at eleven. Thirty minutes are devoted to opening exercises. Passages from the Bible, great hymns, choice poetical selections and fine pieces of music are committed to memory and grouped about great ideas to form a series of services. Fatherhood, Brotherhood, the Leadership of Jesus, Character and Progress, Freedom, Union, Worship, Truth and Service are the great ideas chosen. The imagination is stimulated by reading together great dramatic passages from the Bible. A thread of continuity runs through all these exercises, so that the end of the year shows some definite work accomplished. Thirty-five minutes are given. to the class work, according to the graded course below. Ten minutes are allowed for the transition from class room to the assembly and for the brief closing memory service. The aim is to unite the school in a spirit of worship, truth and service. BOSTON, MASS. DISCIPLES SCHOOL Charles Gordon Ames, Minister ::: Clara Bancroft Beatley, Principal IV. EX-JUNIOR Time, two years. Ages, ten to twelve years First Year. Subject, The New Testament Narratives with Pictures. Memory Work: Twelve great Bible Selections, chosen for their spiritual and An adult class meeting for Bible Study at 10.15 each Sunday morning. The Ethical Lessons are to be associated with the Bible Lessons from Sunday to Sunday, not to stand as a separate Course. Recognition takes place at the completion of the Senior Course. Pupils then join the Disciples Guild and the Lebd-a-Hand Club and continue in the school as Advanced, Graduate, Study, and Bible Classes The Guild has a distinet organization, and is a branch of the Young People's Religious Union. The Lend-a-Hand Club has also a distinct or ganization, and is a branch of the Lend-a-Hand Society 1 Advanced recognition is given to all who complete the advanced work. takes the form of a book with appropriate inscription by the minister. Recognition ETHICAL Simple Lessons on The Duties of Children to Life in School: rades. Foundation Habits: The Neighbor. Habits of Service. Helpfulness, Generosity, Sefldenial, Courtesy of Manner and of Speech. The Young Citizen. Duties of a Free People: Internationalism. Bible Ethics. Ethics of the Old Testa ment and of the New. SOCIAL SERVICE Gifts to Kindergarten for the Blind. Gifts to Homes for Crippled Children. Visits and Gifts to the Home Libraries established by the Children's Aid Society. The Animal Rescue League. Visits, membership, and contributions. Christian evidences; pagan religions, church Later Church: Whitefield, Wes- History of theology; church history; mission history. teaching, personal work Cure and industial foroblems. This curriculum is followed essentially in the Model Sunday-Schools of Union Theological Seminary and Teachers College, Columbia University, and the First Union Presbyterian Church, New York City, the Presbyterian Church. New Rochelle, New York, and many other Sunday-schoole |