Liberty Benton High School - Liberty Bell Yearbook (Findlay, OH)

Page 7 text:

THE LIBERTY BELL Page Five RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS The question of human relationship has been of growing interest since the dawn of human existence. Our day presents a more complex situation than any generation of the past. The questions of rights and liberities, values and privileges, are being rehearsed again and again. In this age of restless casting about for solutions to present problems we feel that we must turn our attention to christian education. Why turn to christian education? Because christianity has within its teachings, prin- ciples which are practical solutions to our international difficulties. There are many problems confronting religious education, one of which is spiritual illiteracy. In the time of our forefathers religion was an integral part of the early colonial schools and the parish pastor was usually the parish schoolmaster. But when it was determined to support universal franchise with universal educational opportunity, it was gradually seen that the formal teaching of religion should be removed from the public school and assumed by the respective churches. With few exceptions all Protestant denominations support the public schools and depend on them for the religious education. The chief instruments of formal religious education are the Sunday school, the denominational college, and the family altar, How efficient have these agencies been as religious teachers? A number of surveys have shown an alarming and almost universal spiritual illiteracy in America. There are in the United States over 58,000,000 people, who are not identified in any way with any church, either Jewish. Protestant, or Catholic. There are 8,000,000 American children under ten years of age, who are growing up in non-church homes. Two out of every three Protestants under twenty-Eve years of age receive no religious instruction or taking the country as a whole seven out of every ten receive no religious education whatever. The democratic institutions of a nation rest upon its religious and moral standards. A nation cannot, therefore, endure with this percent of its children receiving no systematic religious education. Tests have recently been made to show what religious ideas are really prevalent in the minds of the pupils in the public schools. The following questions were submitted in order to obtain this data: What is the purpose of the church? Why should we study the Bible? Why should we pray? I-Iow do you think of Jesus? What does it mean to be a christian? What is sin? What do you think happens after death? The answers to these questions were so illiterate as to be alarming. The church is not succeeding in giving the young people of the land adequate religious concepts. Wherever christian ideas are taught high moral conduct and less law violation will be found. We are spending over S600,000 a year to hire soldiers to guard our mail sacks on rail- road trains. The United States Chamber of Commerce is financing a bureau which has for its specific function training in honesty, but still dishonesty is prevalent. The increase in number of murders and the sensational crime wave that is sweeping the country can be directly traced to the lack of moral and religious training. The American people should be taught at home and at school the sacredness of life. The command Thou shalt not kill, goes unheeded, be- cause education in religion and morals has been sadly neglected. It has been stated that the soldiers of the World War who acquired vicious habits while in the service are responsible for the crimes of today, but the ones who are really committing the most vicious crimes are the boys who were in knee trousers when the World War was in progress. The recent war probably did more harm to the morals of the boys who remained at home than it did to those who were in the service These lads who are our criminals today were on the sidewalks when the soldiers marched away to war. War imagery filled their young minds. They built mental pictures of airship raids, plunder. and murder. and their imaginations were Continued lo Page Twenty-Two

Page 6 text:

ANNUAL STAFF Burner, Ruth Shaw ginia Vir ick, IT1 Ro Efl. ob Fl ck, R Smith, Raymond Clarence SOIL Bm Willi Donald Smith, Standing-Harold 001'- M John rice, P John ukes, D Downing, Helen yncth -G Sitting ukes, Robert Boyd. nD Swisher, Gertrude Agner, Mario Reva Payne ucille mons, L ecil Le aw, C Sh Alice ay, aughman, Editor, Audra D B head, Cloyd

Page 8 text:

Page six THE LIBERTY BELL FACULTY Miss AMELIA HOLDEN MR. HOMER DUNATHAN ' Home Economics Superintendent MR. RAYBURN STEINMAN MR. HAROLD EIBLING MRS. EDITH LIGHTFRITZ English Principal Mathematics MR. RALPH FRANKENFELD Agriculture