The Education of Catholic Girls

by Janet Erskine Stuart

Those who come after them will see what they have done, they cannot see it themselves. With less difficulty perhaps, because reason is more developed and the hot-headed and irritable phase of character is passing away, they will be able to apply the principles which have been laid down. With less difficulty, that is to say against less resistance, but not with less responsibility or even with less anxiety. For the nearer the work approaches to its completion and the more perfectly it has been begun, the more deeply must anyone approaching to lay hand upon it feel the need for great reverence, and self-restraint, and patience, and vigilance, not to spoil by careless interference that which is ready to receive and to give all that is best in youth, not to be unworthy of the confidence which a young mind is willing to place in its guidance.

For although so much stress is laid upon the impressionability of first childhood and the ineffaceable marks that are engraven on it, yet as to all that belongs to the mind and judgment this third period, in the early years of adolescence, is more sensitive still, because real criticism is just beginning to be possible and appreciation is in its spring-tide, now for the first time fully alive and awake. A transition line has been passed, and the study of history, like everything else, enters upon a new phase. The elementary teaching which has been sufficient up to this, which has in fact been the only possible teaching, must widen out in the third period, and the relative importance of aims is the line on which the change to more advanced teaching is felt.

The exercise of judgment becomes the chief object, and to direct this aright is the principal duty of those who teach at this age. It is not easy to give a right discernment and true views. To begin with one must have them oneself, and be able to support them with facts and arguments, they must have the weight of patient work behind them, and have settled themselves deeply in the mind; opinions freshly gathered that very day from an article or an essay are attractive and interesting and they appeal very strongly to young minds looking out for theories and clues, but they only give superficial help; in general, essay-writers and journalists do not expect to be taken too seriously, they intend to be suggestive rather than convincing, and it is a great matter to have the principle understood by girls, that it is not to the journalists that they must look for the last word in a controversy, nor for a permanent presentment of contemporary history. Again, it is necessary to remember the waywardness of girls' minds, and that it is conviction, not submission of views that we must aim at. A show of authority is out of place, the tone that "you must think as I do," tends without any bad will on the part of children to exasperate them and rouse the spirit of opposition, whereas a patient and even deferential hearing of their views and admission of their difficulties ensures at least a mind free from irritation and impatience, to listen and to take into account what we have to say. They are not to be blamed for having difficulties in accepting what we put before them; on the contrary we must welcome their independent thought even if it seems aggressive and conceited; their positive assurance that they see to the end of things is characteristic of their age, but it is better that they should show themselves thus, than through want of thought or courage fall in with everything that is set before them, or, worse still, take that pose of impartiality which allows no views at all, and in the end obliterates the line between right and wrong. The too submissive minds which give no trouble now, are laying it all up for the future. They accept what we tell them without opposition, others will come later on, telling them something different, and they will accept it in the same way, and correct their views day by day to the readings of the daily paper, or of the vogue of their own particular set. These are the minds which in the end are absorbed by the world: the Church receives neither love nor service from them.

Judgment may be passed upon actions as right or wrong in themselves, or as practically adapting means to end; the first is of great interest even to young children, but for them it is all black or white, and characters are to them entirely good or entirely bad, deserving of unmixed admiration or of their most excellent hatred, which they pour out simply and vehemently, rejoicing without qualms of pity when punishment overtakes the wrongdoer and retributive justice is done to the wicked. This is perhaps what makes them seem bloodthirsty in their vengeance; they feel that so it ought to be, and that the affirmation of principle is of more account than the individual. They detest half-measures and compromise. For the elder girls it is not so simple, and the nearer they come to our own times the more necessary is it to put before them that good is not always unaccompanied by evil nor evil by good.

In the last two or three years of a girl's education all the time that can be spared may be most profitably spent on the study of modern history, since it is there that the more complex problems are found, and there also that they will understand how contemporary questions have their springs in the past, and see the rise of the forces which are at work now, disintegrating the nations of Europe and shaking the foundations of every government. There are grave lessons to be learnt, not in gloomy or threatening forecasts but in showing the direction of cause and effect and the renewal of the same struggle which has been from the beginning, in ever fresh phases. The outcome of historical teaching to Catholics can never be discouragement or depression, whatever the forecast. The past gives confidence, and, when the glories of bygone ages are weighed against their troubles, and the Church's troubles now against her inward strength and her new horizons of hope, there is great reason for gratitude that we live in our own much-abused time. In every age the Church has, with her roots in the past, some buds and blossoms in the present and some fruit coming on for the future. Hailstorms may cut off both blossoms and fruit, but all will not be lost. We can always hold up our heads; there are buds on the fig-tree and we know in whom we have believed.

In bringing home to children these grounds for thankfulness, the quality of one's own mind and views tells very strongly, and this leads to the consideration of what is chiefly required in teaching history to children, and to girls growing up. The first and most essential point is that we ourselves should care about what we teach, not that we should merely like history as a school subject, but that it should be real to us, that we should feel something about it, joy or triumph or indignation, things which are not found in text-books, and we should believe that it all matters very much to the children and to ourselves. Lessons of the text-book type, facts, dates, summaries, and synopses matter very little to children, but people are of great importance, and if they grasp what often they only half believe, that what they are repeating as a mere lesson really took place among people who saw and felt it as vividly as they would themselves, then their sympathies and understanding are carried beyond the bounds of their school-rooms and respond to the touch of the great doings and sufferings of the race.

It is above all in the history of the Church that this sympathetic understanding becomes real. The interest of olden times in secular history is more dramatic and picturesque than real to children; but in the history of the Church and especially of the personalities of the popes the continuity of her life is very keenly felt; the popes are all of to-day, they transcend the boundaries of their times because in a number of ways they did and had to do and bear the very same things that are done and have to be borne by the popes of our own day. If we give to girls some vivid realization, say, of the troubled Pontificate of Boniface VIII, with the violence and tragedy and pathos in which it ended, after the dust and jarring and weariness of battle in which it was spent; if they have entered into something of the anguish of Pius VII, they will more fully understand and feel deeper love and sympathy for the living, suffering successor now in the same chair, in another phase of the same conflict, with the Gentiles and peoples of the rising democracies taking counsel together against him, as kings and rulers did in the past, all imagining the same "vain thing," that they can overcome Christ and His Vicar.

Besides this living sympathy with what we teach, we must be able to speak truth without being afraid of its consequences. There was at one time a fear in the minds of Catholic teachers that by admitting that any of the popes had been unworthy of their charge, or that there had ever been abuses which called for reforms among clergy and religious and Catholic laity, they would be giving away the case for the Church and imperilling the faith and loyalty of children; that it was better they should only hear these things later, with the hope that they would never hear them at all. The real peril is in the course thus adopted. Surrounded as we are by non-Catholics, and in a time when no Catholic escapes from questions and attacks, open or covert, upon what we believe, the greatest injustice to the girls themselves, and to the honour of the faith, was to send them out unarmed against what they must necessarily meet. The first challenge would be met with a flat denial of facts, loyal-heartedly and confidently given; then would come a suspicion that there might be something in it, the inquiry which would show that this was really the case; then a certain right indignation, "Why was I not told the truth?" and a sense of insecurity vaguely disturbing the foundations which ought to be on immovable bed-rock. At the best, such an experience produces what builders call a "settlement," not dangerous to the fabric but unsightly in its consequences; it may, however, go much further, first to shake and then to loosen the whole spiritual building by the insinuation of doubt everywhere. It is impossible to forewarn children against all the charges which they may hear against the Church, but two points well established in their minds will give them confidence.

1. That the evidence which is brought to light year after year from access to State papers and documents tells on the side of the Church, as we say in England, of "the old religion," and not against it. Books by non-Catholics are more convincing than others in this matter, since they are free from the suspicion of partisanship; for instance, Gairdner's "Lollardy and the Reformation" which disposes of many mythical monsters of Protestant history.

2. That even if the facts were still more authentic to justify personal attacks on some of the popes, even if the abuses in the Church had not been grossly exaggerated, even putting facts at their worst, granting all that is assumed, it tends to strengthen faith rather than to undermine it, for the existence of the Church and the Papacy as they are to-day is a wonder only enhanced by every proof that it ought to have perished long ago according to all human probability. With that confidence and assurance even our little girls may hold their heads high, with their faith and trust in the Church quite unabashed, and wait for an answer if they cannot give it to others or to themselves at the moment. "We have no occasion to answer thee concerning this matter," said the three holy children to Nabuchodonosor, and so may our own children say if they are hard pressed, "your charges do but confirm our faith, we have no occasion to answer."