THE RELATION OF THE SEMINARY TO THE

GENERAL EDUCATIONAL PROBLEM*

I have been requested to prepare a paper for this meeting of the Catholic Educational Association on "The Relation of the Seminary to the General Educational Problem." In these United States we Catholics have been wrestling with this great question from a dual motive, viz: The securing of the continuation of Christ's splendid mission among the children of men and the assuring of the permanency of our much loved and greatly appreciated republican institutions. For we realize that the two must go hand in hand. And in our struggle for the Christianizing and civilization of our fellow-citizens who can say we have not been terribly in earnest? No sacrifice has seemed too great, no difficulty has proved too insurmountable, no perseverance has been found too trying in the grand and glorious struggle we have continued at great odds through all these years, until now our indomitable spirit of supernatural Faith and Christian enthusiasm has been crowned with the acknowledged success of our great system of Christian education in all its branches, from the humble parochial schools to the proud universities covering this fair land from one end of it to the other.

The Catholic Church needs no apology for its ever insistent demand for the Christian education of its children. The history of 2,000 years attests the Church's interest in things educational. Ever making the intellectual the handmaid of the supernatural, she has builded up, century by century, that most admirable system of Scholastic training which is the marvel of all thinking men. She has blazed the way down through the years

*Read at the eighth annual meeting of the Catholic Educational Association, Chicago, 1911.

of pioneer endeavor, where others have been led to falteringly follow, until today she stands first and foremost in the ranks of educators, offering to the world the only education worthy of the name.

Education must advance as civilization develops and makes progress among the people. And with the immensely rich traditions of our Catholic history in the past, who shall deny us a still more glorious future of accomplishment?

The particular point I am requested to develop in this paper is the relation of the seminary to our practical educational work in the parish school.

The intellectual and moral character of the pupil will rise no higher than the exemplar he finds in the teacher who guides his embryonic attempts to assimilate the matter day by day provided for his mental food. In turn, the teacher is more or less dependent for successful work upon the encouragement and wisely guided counsels of the priest in charge of the local school energies. If he be well fitted for his all important task, capable of entering into the great work entrusted to his care, equipped intellectually and pedagogically, the school is sure of accomplishing the splendid results of a thoroughly well organized institution. If, on the contrary, he be ill prepared by neglect of study or proper guidance along these lines during his seminary course, the school is bound to be recognized as but a makeshift, doing more harm to the cause of Christian education than if it did not exist. Too often, in the past, have the best efforts of the great Teaching Orders of these United States been hampered in their work because the priest, learned and zealous though he may have been, and willing to do his best, was uninformed as to proper school principles by reason of this particular feature of the sacred ministry in these parts having been overlooked or neglected in his seminary training.

I believe it to be a matter of paramount importance that some general system of pedagogy founded on the best methods now accepted by educators be insisted upon as a part of the seminary curriculum if we would go forward in this great work of Catholic education.

Although the pastor is supposed to be the guiding principle of the parish school activities, of necessity much of the parish school work must be entrusted to the care of his curates, especially in the large city parishes. The pastor generally has not the time or the inclination to instruct his younger assistants in the manner of his work among the school children. If the young priest has not learned the most effective and best adapted methods of school work in his preparation for the sacred ministry, his only alternative is to learn by experience as his pastor did before him, and experience is a stern teacher for both priest and pupil, often resulting in most disastrous results to both.

An objection may be raised that the present course of studies in our seminaries leaves but scant time for aught else. The curriculum of studies I admit, already demands strenuous application and hard study on the part of the candidate for Holy Orders; but we are considering in this topic the better fitting of our young priests for taking up the great work of instruction and intellectual development which our parish schools are endeavoring to carry out for the honor and glory of God and the salvation of souls. Surely these motives must appeal in a very forceful manner even to the hard-worked professor and students of the seminary.

The knowledge of philosophy and theology and canon law and liturgy and Scripture and chant are rightly insisted upon as a sine qua non in the candidate for the sacred priesthood. But in our rather singular and complex relation of pastor and people in this republic, in the peculiar position we find ourselves in regard to school

conditions, I venture to suggest that a practical way of assuring the very highest success of our splendid system of Catholic schools, would be to give at least some general instruction during the seminary course in pedagogy and the manner of successfully managing a parochial school. Under present conditions, this is one of the most important features of our priestly work among the people. For we must never forget that these little ones under our care today are to be the faithful of God's church tomorrow and on the manner in which we do our duty towards them in the school physically, intellectually and morally will depend the Church of the future.

In the limits and scope of this paper it would be presumptuous in me to offer more than a suggestion as to the best means of remedying an admitted weakness in our school system. I have but endeavored to put before this convention the present need of help from the seminary for more successful work in our parish school, the need as I see it after an experience of nearly thirty years in parish school work. If I shall have succeeded in impressing upon the good directors of our seminaries the necessity of arousing a holy enthusiasm among the young levites under them and a generous spirit of sacrifice for this greatest work of the American Church among us-the successful parish school-I shall be happy in having prompted some thought leading up to the higher efficiency of our Catholic educational system.

Detroit, Mich.

FRANCIS J. VAN ANTWERP.

EDUCATION IN SOUTH AMERICA

During the colonial period in Iberian-America, that is, in the Spanish and Portuguese possessions on this side of the Atlantic, religion always proceeded hand in hand with exploration, colonization, and civilization. State and Church were intimately united, though their mutual relations were not always peaceful, as the correspondence of the times permits us to discover. However, the ecclesiastical spirit pervaded everything, and it is impossible for the student of history to lose sight of the Church. She accompanied the rough soldier into the wilderness, as she had followed the hardy mariner across the seas. She strove to curb their passions, to prevent their cruelties and injustices and to save their souls. If the natives of America seemed to be the first objects of her solicitude, she did not forget the conquistadores and their children. From the beginning she made education her foremost duty. Schools were established for the Indian wherever the Spaniard went, and some famous colleges arose, like that of Santa Cruz in Mexico, founded by the Franciscans, and the large Jesuit college, Colegio del Principe in Lima, which owed its origin to the poet-viceroy, Prince of Esquilache, descendant of St. Francis Borgia. Colleges like that of El Rosario at Bogota, were, in course of time, established for the Spaniards, and centers of higher education, like the Universities of Lima, Mexico, Quito, Bogota, and the Jesuit College of Tucuman, spread their light throughout Spanish America. While in Brazil, too, such educators as the Jesuits were doing a noble work, no university, strange to say, seems ever to have been founded in the Portuguese dominions.

Education during the colonial period was entirely in