Couldn't Help Noticing

Surrogate parenting

Writing in yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald (‘When schools are surrogate parents, only the best will do’), Hugh Mackay may have put his finger on a number of telling points. I'm sure he's right that some parents are looking to delegate the discipline and instruction of their children (especially in life values and morality). And I'm quite sure he's right that in many quarters education has become a ‘product’ to buy, like a BMW, with plenty of shopping around and tire kicking going on.

But as is usual in this debate, the lumping of all private schools into one big, homogenous group, leads to damaging stereotypes.

As the Chairman of a Christian school, I know from personal experience that some schools consciously fight against the trends Mackay describes.

Our school is a ‘parent controlled’ school. This means that it emphasizes that the responsibility of ‘discipline and instruction’ is primarily on the parents of the child, and that they are responsible not just for the domestic aspect of that education, but for the school hours component as well.

But it is also a ‘Christian’ school, so we understand that the ‘discipline and instruction’ must be ‘of the Lord’ (Eph 6:4) for it to be of lasting worth.

And no, Hugh, not all private school fees are $12,000 per annum. Some are much better value than that—providing quality education (yes, even leading to good UAI's) that is imbued with a Christian worldview and values which are based on more than just “when I were a lad” traditions.

Money - it’s a gas

This article (via kottke.org) is a fairly good one about why it is that rich people aren't always happy. Robert Frank comes to the conclusion that money can buy happiness, if you spend it not on consumer goods, but rather on things that will allow you to spend more time with friends and family, or give you more time to enjoy life.

Which sounds suspiciously like Ecclesiastes 5:10-20.

v.10 He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income; this also is vanity.

v.18 Behold, what I have seen to be good and fitting is to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil with which one toils under the sun the few days of his life that God has given him, for this is his lot.

Isn't it great when modern society catches up with something written thousands of years ago?

The life of the unwanted

Like many people I stayed up and watched My Foetus on Compass last night, and like many, I have an opinion on abortion in general and that particular documentary.

But one thing that was left out of the decision making process on the program was the option of adoption. When the doctor from the UK, who performs abortions routinely, was interviewed he claimed that when performing late abortions (beyond 20 weeks) he is carrying those out very much for the sake of the baby, because a “foetus” terminated at 21 weeks is “seriously unwanted”—and the implication was that it was therefore better off dead.

But what difference would it make to that decision making process if the foetus was known to be ‘wanted’ by someone other than the woman carrying it, by one of the many childless couples on adoption queues? And which option might the ‘foetus’ take, if it was given a ‘choice’? The decision might then become not about whether or not a life was wanted, but about the next 30 weeks of time (until the birth) in the life of the pregnant woman.

Who is it who has to ‘want’ a baby before its life is worth living?

Funding challenge

The NSW Teacher's Federation has publicly announced that it intends to investigate a High Court challenge to the funding of non-government schools, particularly those with a religious affiliation (eg. church schools that see their role as part of the mission of the church).

Apparently it is OK to fund the education of secular humanists, but not OK to fund the education of Christians or Muslims or Jews. If you don't think the humanists have a religious ‘mission’ to change our society through schools, think again:

I am convinced that the battle for humankind's future must be waged in the public school by teachers who correctly perceive their role as the proselytizers of a new faith ... these teachers ... will be ministers of another sort, utilizing a classroom instead of a pulpit, to convey humanist values in whatever subject they teach... [John Dunphy, ‘A Religion for a New Age’, The Humanist 43:1 (Jan/Feb 1983)].

According to the Association of Independent Schools (AIS)*,

over one million young Australians are educated in schools with a religious affiliation. The families of these children believe that spirituality or religious traditions and values play a very important role in the education of the whole person.

Already, students attending non-government schools receive far less overall government funding than students attending government-owned schools. Eligibility for funding depends on the school being registered to teach the state approved curriculum.

In Australia, freedom of choice in education comes at a cost, and for most families that means great financial sacrifice. Now the rights of parents to influence their children's schooling is being eroded too. This is bad for families, bad for children and will weaken Australian democracy.

Personally, I hope they proceed with the challenge. I would love to witness the High Court hearing arguments on the ‘religious assumptions’ taught in government schools, and sending their challenge packing. There is, after all, no such thing as religiously ‘neutral’ education.

Not to mention the opportunity to point out the practical consideration that if government funding is significantly reduced to religious schools, there will be a huge exodus to government schools, and a massive blowout in the cost of education in this country as all these parents stop making major personal contributions to the cost of their child's education.

Oh yes, and there is always Article 26 (3) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.” (see http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html).

So I suspect their “investigation into a High Court challenge” may crash and burn and never be heard of again. Shame really.

* Media Release, 16 July 2004.

Orwellian Abortion

George Orwell is one of those figures, like Martin Luther, C. S. Lewis and G. K. Chesterton, who seems to be adopted by various (and even opposing) groups as their champion. Perhaps it has something to do with the sheer volume of their output, and their extreme ‘quotability’. In Orwell's case, he is as much loved and quoted by the Left, as he is used against the Left by the Right, who love to reproduce his stringent attacks against Communism and Soviet Russia.

The latest group to take Orwell to their side is the pro-life lobby. Writing on the website Crisis, Mark Stricherz suggests that Orwell might be a welcome ally in the public battle against abortion, since he opposed it not on religious or theological grounds (he was an agnostic), but on the more broadly accepted humanitarian grounds of reason and moral conscience.

In his novel, Keep the Aspidistra Flying, Orwell has his main character, Gordon Comstock, confront the reality of his girlfriend's pregnancy by at first being horrified, and then coming to realise his responsibility for the unborn child. Grappling with whether to abort the baby or not, Gordon goes to the public library and reads a book on embryology. As he views pictures of the developing foetus, Gordon muses:

His baby had seemed real to him from the moment when Rosemary spoke of abortion ... But here was the actual process taking place. Here was the poor ugly thing, no bigger than a gooseberry, that he had created by his heedless act. Its future—its continued existence perhaps—depended on him. Besides, it was a bit of himself—it was himself. Dare one dodge such a responsibility as that?

For pro-choicers who suggest that pro-lifers are just religious fanatics, it may be worth suggesting they read Orwell.