They do not realize that they greatly endanger thereby also the foundations of the state. The foundations of our governments rest upon Christianity. The Christian faith created the state, created matrimony, family, and the education of the youth; created the social virtues of loyalty and of obedience. What we have of religion is Christian, what we have of the religious support of morality is equally Christian; “Christianity, Christian faith, Christian formation of life penetrates all vital utterances of the Occidental world like an all-pervading element” (Paulsen).
It is one of the first principles of political prudence not to shake the foundations upon which the state rests. States and nations are not ephemeral beings, existing from one day to the other, they are historical structures measuring their lives by centuries; past generations join hands with present generations, deeds and customs of the fathers live on in their sons.
States must remain on the historical tracks on which they have travelled to success, at least until the new track has stood the test of reliability. So far anti-Christian philosophy has terribly shaken governments; it has not yet proved itself a state-conserving principle.
It is a sad condition to see the guardians of states, devoid of historical appreciation, allow their people to tear themselves away from the soil wherein reposed the roots from which they drew life and strength. Sad, too, that complaints are made of college-professors who abuse freedom in teaching by constructing an unproved contradiction between knowledge and faith, by misrepresenting Christian tenets, by lowering the prestige of the Church, by distorting her historical picture. It would be regrettable for a Christian state, if the complaint were justified that for the most part our colleges have become places where religion is ignored; where the name of Jesus Christ, the Redeemer of mankind, is no longer mentioned; where the name of God never occurs in history, in natural and political science; where religion is considered the most unessential factor of mental life, a factor that has nothing to offer, that can answer no question—a treatment which, by the force of suggestion, must lead young men to think that religion is of no account. It is a banishment which in its effect is little different from an attack upon religion.
Sadder still would it be if the following view were to prevail at our colleges: “A right of the student to see protected and not destroyed any views and convictions, including those of a religious nature, which he may bring to the university from his home surroundings, from his preliminary education, as it is asserted time and again in the frequent complaints about the dechristianizing of youth at the universities—does not exist and cannot exist, because it would be in contradiction to the very essence of the university and its tasks” (Jodl).
Is not this the ethical principle of the bird of prey? Is it not allowed to guard the defenceless chick against the hawk? Christian people send their sons to the university, and demand that the education of the parental home be spared, that the inexperience of youth be not misused. The state must demand that the religious-moral education which it furthers in its public schools be not destroyed by the higher schools. Yet, all these rights must be silenced the moment the vision of the absolute freedom of teaching makes its appearance, since to refrain from dechristianizing the youth would be contrary to his tasks.
If such abuse in the management of the power of knowledge, within and without colleges, is not counteracted by all possible means, then none need be surprised when a science free from religion and Christianity is followed by an elementary school free from religion, when in public and preparatory schools the free-thinking teacher is telling the pupils that there is no creation but only evolution, and that the gospels and biblical history are poetical stories such as the Nibelungenlied and the Iliad and Odyssey.
We cannot be astonished to find the following rules advocated for the instruction in public schools: “Religious instruction in schools should not differ from the instruction in other subjects, namely, one of full freedom, bound only by recognized documents and personalities of religious literature and religious science. The school must teach that which is, it must present the tenets of all times and all nations in so far as this is possible within its modest compass.... But if the pupil should ask, What really is? What position should the teacher assume toward this question? In my opinion, he should speak in plain terms. He should say: There are people who believe all that is taught by the different systems of religion.... The child may further ask of the teacher whether he himself believes. No teacher who claims the confidence of the children should shirk the answer. He may confess his faith or disbelief, without need of worry. It cannot hurt his prestige in the eyes of the child, because, if for no other reason, either way he will find himself in an equally large and good company” (Tews).
But we hear much more radical utterances. For instance, the official organ of teachers in a Catholic country urges defection from the Church in the following words: “How long will Social-Democracy, now so formidable, remain inactive against clerical arrogance? How much longer will it shirk a duty that is clear to the dullest eye? If the millions of our Social-Democrats, including the women and children, would break away from Rome, the priestcraft in Austria is as good as defeated. A grave responsibility rests upon the Social-Democratic leaders. Should they miss the moment to act, they will be judged by history!” (Deutsch-oesterreichische Lehrerzeitung, June 1, 1909).
Another organ of teachers declares Christianity to be nothing else but victorious heresy, for which Christ had to lay down His life the same as Giordano, Hus, and countless others. “The subject of religion as taught in the preparatory schools is for the most part taken from ages whose customs and morals are—happily—no longer ours.” We see radicalism rampant in large circles of public school teachers, demanding noisily, excitedly, and, of course, in the name of modern science and enlightenment, the abolition of the divine service, of prayer, and religious instruction in school, giving as reason that, “as to matters of mental freedom no difference should be made between a [pg 359]university and a village school.” That our people will “carelessly waste their Christian patrimony, this is the great danger.”