Why Catholic Education Must Transmit More Than Knowledge

Catholic schools must focus on more than academics — authentic Catholic education is a formation of mind, heart and culture rooted in Christ.

(Photo by Ken Mostek)

By Michael Edghill Associate Superintendent for Mission Archdiocese of Denver

From the nature of the Catholic school also stems one of the most significant elements of its educational project: the synthesis between culture and faith. Indeed, knowledge set in the context of faith becomes wisdom and life vision. The endeavour to interweave reason and faith, which has become the heart of individual subjects, makes for unity, articulation and coordination, bringing forth within what is learnt in school a Christian vision of the world, of life, of culture and of history. In the Catholic school's educational project there is no separation between time for learning and time for formation, between acquiring notions and growing in wisdom. The various school subjects do not present only knowledge to be attained, but also values to be acquired and truths to be discovered. All of which demands an atmosphere characterized by the search for truth, in which competent, convinced and coherent educators, teachers of learning and of life, may be a reflection, albeit imperfect but still vivid, of the one Teacher. In this perspective, in the Christian educational project all subjects collaborate, each with its own specific content, to the formation of mature personalities. The Catholic School on the Threshold of the Third Millennium, 14

The call for Catholic schools to be places of an integral human formation by synthesizing culture and faith appears numerous times throughout the Church’s publications on Catholic education — in documents like The Catholic School, Lay Catholics in Schools: Witnesses to Faith and The Religious Dimension of Education in a Catholic School.

But what does it mean for a Catholic school to synthesize culture and faith within its educational program? To answer this question, we must first evaluate what culture means.

Culture can be defined in various ways, with a variety of different essential elements. Regardless of how many elements are identified and how they are specifically defined, culture is generally identified as those beliefs, values, norms, symbols, languages, cuisines and systems of economics and governance that a people hold in common. How does our society speak, interact and govern itself? What are the traditional activities that we engage in? What do we respect and place value in? How do we decide what is good and what is bad?

As it turns out, all these elements and the answers to these questions are offered to students in the school setting. Beyond the mere transfer of functional knowledge from teachers to pupils, schools transmit culture from generation to generation through direct instruction of content, what students are assigned to read, what holidays we choose to celebrate and who we choose to honor. You would be hard-pressed to find even a public school that does not focus part of its work on character development with its students.

So, how do we ensure our Catholic schools are places of synthesis between culture and faith? Since this synthesis is identified as “one of the most significant elements of [the Catholic school’s] educational project”, how can we possibly integrate our faith with these elements of culture that seemingly become more divergent from each other every day?

First, we must define what culture we seek to transmit to our children. Is it Catholic culture or American culture? While there once was a time when the foundational elements of American culture and Catholic culture were not so opposed to one another and actually supported one another in some cases, our modern cultural context no longer affords us that luxury. To be clear, this is not to say that one can’t be a faithful Catholic and a proud American. It is, however, to suggest that the norms, beliefs, values, judgments of right and wrong and various other things that bind society together in a culture are becoming more divergent between the American population at large and what the Catholic faith teaches and expects of us. Within the post-modern cultural context that breathes relativism and materialism, we are called to be counter-cultural and witness to our own Catholic culture and the joy of the Gospel that inspires that culture.

Therefore, if we seek to create a synthesis between culture and faith, we should focus the attention of our Catholic schools on transmitting a Catholic culture to our students. What are our beliefs, norms, values and symbols? How do we speak and interact together? What traditions, activities and celebrations do we engage in? How do we decide what is good and bad?

Being clear about the culture we seek to transmit and the faith we want to hand on to our students subsequently impacts school decisions. While others debate which authors should be read for their various personal attributes and diverse viewpoints, we can focus our decisions on whether the text supports the formation of the faith, of Christian virtue or whether it offers a meaningful consideration of something good, true or beautiful. While others debate what version of history should be taught, whether it be an exploitationist or exceptionalist view of history, we can focus on how we teach the history of the human experience, animated by human acts of virtue and sin, in light of the salvation that has come through Jesus Christ and the establishment of his Church. While others suggest that science explains experiences and phenomena of the natural world that religion can’t answer, we can speak confidently from the Catholic intellectual tradition and form our students with an understanding that faith and reason go hand in hand.

In doing all of these things, and more, our Catholic schools become places of authentic human formation where the synthesis of culture and faith is alive and serves as a beautiful support for our young people becoming faithful disciples of Jesus Christ and witnesses of the faith in the midst of this rapidly changing American culture.