Academy of the Immaculate Conception - Pax Yearbook (Ferdinand, IN)

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'NN-Sn 1 P jg GRAIJUATION .IUNIC 4, 1939 Tn-ns PHOTO Possum: BY COURTESY OF ACADEMY IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

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COIVIIVIENCEIVIENT to the truths so graciously presented by His Heavenly Father to man-yes, the Church was to be an infallible interpreter. Tender Mother that she is, the Bride of Christ on earth brings to the Catholic mind a deep knowledge of the Godhead. Not only does she present to man the dogmatic truths of her holy Faith, but, in the sphere of morals, she leads him on through the ways of virtue that a life of service born of heavenly love may inerit for him the happiness of an eternity of ove. The second question under consideration is, What is man, what is his nature? Once again, for the Catholic mind, the answer is not so difficult. Man is not a mere accident in the universe, the product of blind forces stirring the slime. He is far superior to any- thing in the animal kingdom, he is a little less than the angels. In short, he possesses a body, but the life principle in him is a spirit- ual immortal soul. Nor is it a mere fanciful thought that man has been made to the image and likeness of his God. Very likely, it is not altogether surprising to you that there are numerous men and women, totally different from you, living in the world you are to face on the morrow-men and women whose philosophy of life can not be defined as otherwise than wholly secular. They have long since arrived at the conclu- sion that man has no destiny beyond the tomb and that the reason for existence must be sought somewhere in the interim between the cradle and the grave. They admit readily enough that Christ lived centuries ago. How- ever they regard Him merely as an historical religious champion. In spite of the influence Christianity is bound to exert upon them, they refuse to solve the great questions of life by the tenets of the followers of Christ. Asceticism, they hold in disdain, and they look for happiness not in self-denial, but rather in its antithesis, self-indulgence. What a strict line of demarcation there is between the Catholic whose philosophy of life and philosophy of education are based upon self- conquest and the philosophies of those world- lings whose ideals are purely secular! The very idea of there being anything in common between these two camps is positively ridicu- lous. The two systems of education differ in content, method and aim. The one is purely of this world, the other cooperates with the grace of God to transform a child of the flesh into a child of the spirit. You may well be proud of the school you have been privileged to attend, the Academy which is your Alma Mater. A brief survey of the history of our glorious country reveals the fact, startling to many, that the private school and the Catholic school preceded the public school system, so prevalent in this our day. Sad to say, because of its attitude of neutrality in things religious, the public school has produced a generation educated, it is true, but not well rounded. Thorough edu- cation demands that religion be woven into the very warp and woof of the child's life. Christianity cannot be reduced to a mere rallying point for Sunday sentiment. Religion must needs be the very heart and soul of the discipline, curriculum, and atmosphere. If the growing child is to be thoroughly educated for time and eternity. Even such a mundane thing as the study of mathematics demands a religious touch. Between the covers of a modern textbook of mathematics, there is contained plenty of social and economic doc- trine which must be studied in the light of the teaching of Christ. A numerical figure is, after all, a social institution that really plays an important part in the thought and action of daily life. Hence, the contention that absolutely nothing in the educational field can be neglected, where the religious side is concerned, is not bizarre and pietistic. In all things the truth of Christ must be established. As the body must have food or it will perish, so, too, the mind must be sustained: its food is knowledge, its very life is truth. What is truth ? His pagan judge asked of Christ Himself, and there was no answer. Indeed, no answer was necessary, a few hours be- fore, while at supper with His followers, our Divine Saviour had said: My word is truth. He had also said to the multitude surrounding him, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Obviously, we are not dealing here with truth in the scientific sense, of truth departmentalized. We are concerned with ultimate truth, and elemental reality. The working value and the practical success of the Christian principle in education have been amply demonstrated in each and every age of the glorious history of the Church, from the very time when the first followers of the saintly Benedict left the world yet dried up the swamps of a frontier Europe on their way to heaven, and either invented or preserved whatever they found to be worth while in a decaying civilization torn asunder by selfish men who cared not to concern themselves about anything beyond the mar-

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