The Shepherd, July 2008
THE RELIGIOUS UPBRINGING OF CHILDREN
By Archpriest S. Shchukin
UP-BRINGING AND FORMATION
WE MUST distinguish between a child’s up-bringing and their formation. In our days understanding of this is often muddled. In the English language there is not even a word for Vospitanie [which we have rendered “up-bringing”- transl.], although there is the general term “education,” which covers both up-bringing and formation. This leads to the muddled understanding, but we should strictly distinguish between the two processes. Upbringing is the process of building the moral and spiritual side in the child, and formation in this case is the process of developing the intellectual (rational) side. It concerns a person’s two different aptitudes: his moral personality and his mental ability. There is absolutely no basis for thinking that up-bringing, i.e. the development of the mental capabilities of a person, will also give him moral maturity. In life we may meet highly educated people, who are nonetheless completely “un-brought-up,” even though they might be professors. And conversely we see people who have no education whatsoever, for instance simple peasants, who have been raised with a spiritual and moral disposition.
We cannot deny that schools today [this was some time ago! - transl.] do attempt to give children not only intellectual training but also up-bringing, but for schools the latter takes a back seat. Greater attention is paid to knowledge and speeding their intellectual growth. Furthermore children start school at an age, when the bases of their moral upbringing have already been laid within the family. And that is precisely our present subject.
Besides, we must also strictly distinguish between a normal upbringing and a religious one. Everyone deprived of a religious upbringing - whether it be by the family, the school or the state (for instance, by the closure of academic institutions) - will pursue temporary or local goals that are linked to the family, community or the government. Thus, for instance, contemporary American schools promote the cause of “upbringing in liberty;” on the contrary, the Soviet system of education strives to make a person an obedient tool of the State. In both cases an upbringing, true for the soul, is not achieved, because they have in view not what is good for a person in the higher sense, but only with a vogue political or social purpose. In such cases the purpose of the education is not the benefit of the person himself, but the interests of the state or of society. Political circumstances change - and so do educational systems. Thus children become victims of these educational systems, which usually conflict with one another.
Religious up-bringing is another matter, which always pursues one and the same aim - the spiritual flowering of the child’s soul; and it is established on eternal spiritual bases. The purposes of a Christian up-bringing do not fluctuate depending on the political and philosophical spirit of the times. Naturally, we often hear accusations of Christian education’s backwardness or its “being divorced from the real world,” but what can science propose to replace an Christian foundation in education?
In reference to the up-bringing of our children, Christianity does not concern itself with fashion, nor with the demands of the government, but it holds fast to its own educational methods. This derives not from some sort of “fanaticism,” but simply from the fact that a religious upbringing is bound up with those eternal laws which order the spiritual life of man. Ages pass, conditions in society change, but the nature of the human soul stays the same. Christianity continues to found its educational methods on God’s ten commandments and upon the teaching of the Gospel. Thus it will continue until the end. “For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law” (Matt. 5:18).
Finally the aim of a religious education consists in this: it strives to transform the child interiorly, and not simply to drill him in accord with extrinsic regulations. The advantage of such an up-bringing is indisputable, because only through the inner culturing of a person can he face all the difficulties of life, stand firm before temptation, and find the right path. But to achieve this, it is necessary that from infancy he not only knows the rules of conduct, but that he possesses that inner integrity, which will clearly distinguish good from evil.
That this integrity of soul might be formed in a child, one must base all his upbringing on the best aspects in human nature, which were placed within us by the Creator. Parents need to know what these foundations of a religious education are, so that they are able to bring up their children, and not instruct them in things which lead to experiences which will only bring them harm. We know of cases where parents, who are themselves not experienced or firm in the Faith, therefore entrust the upbringing of their children to believers, sending them to monasteries or church schools. They act very wisely, for the centuries old experience of the Church is more to be trusted than modish theories in education.
… to be continued in the next issue
with “The Aim of a Christian Up-Bringing”
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