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. . . . Christian kids were better educated than everyone else? In this week’s WORLD, Ed Veith discusses the cultural ramifications in film and television.
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A matter of life
“Christian kids were educated than everyone else?”
Huh?
Happy Saturday!!!!
Fixed, Laura. Remember, Lynn’s on the Left Coast, and it’s early out there.
I am just imagining what Ed/qwerty would say if he were replying to this topic. Though he probably would have had a cardiac event just thinking about it.
If there is no truth, what is there to teach?
Nicely stated! Our kids went through the Christian education system with more or less success. Some schools are better than others. Government schools tend to excel Christians schools in certain areas like math and science in the upper grades. This is probably due to the ability to pay more highly trained teachers.
However, Christian education is generally superior to government education according to standardized testing and they do it for less than half the cost! The other advantage is they are free to teach the whole truth, unhampered by city hall.
Veith’s self serving essay is wrong It’s way off. It’s self serving becatse he’s running Patrick Henry College, and he’s spend most, if not all, of his career in higher education.
It’s wrong. way wrong, for several reasons. For one, more than anything else, it’s the media that shapes our culture. TV and movies have done far more to change America in the last 50 years than all the college professors, lawyers, and doctors combined. Adn the people who run the media are notoriously anti-Christian, and aren’t about to begin welcoming Christians into the club any time soon.
Second, breeding habits are about to replace the media as the biggest shaper of culture. Many authors have made powerful arguments that the reasons nations and culture fizzle is that their low IQ population has more kids than their high IQ population. This idea was recently turned into a movie called Idiocracy. Christians can all their kids off to college and grad school, but when they’re being outbred by the millions by people who sit around watching wrestling, listening to hip hop, watching around 40 hours of TV a week, who never read a book, whose idea of high culture is attending a NASCAR race, well, it’s not going to make much difference. Demographics is destiny, and Christians gave up that fight a long time ago. A religion that celebrates its young women, like Sarah Rode, going into the military instead of getting married and having babies is a religion that is dying out. It’s a religion of death.
Christians should have been having extremely large families if they wanted to shape the culture. But they didn’t. I saw a an ABC news report online about the Quiver Full movement. Those people get it, but they’re a very tiny group. There’s not enough of them to make an impact, and it’s far too late.
No, education isn’t the key to shaping culture in a nation like ours. The two biggest factors are, by far, the media and demographics.
Night Train is on to something. I don’t watch 40 hours of TV, but I do watch some of the quiz shows, like Jeopardy and Millionaire, and it seems the contestants do much better at the pop culture questions than anything else.
Oh please . . .
Say it with me now, “We’ve got education, yes we do! We’ve got education, how about You!!”
It is early on the left coast, maybe that’s why I’m in such a cynical mood.
It would be nice if someone would refute Night Train here. Unfortunately, what he’s saying makes an awful lot of sense. And, he doesn’t even go into immigration-related demographics.
Furthermore, educated or not, every time a Christian attempts to shape the culture, he’s assaulted with accusations of Dominionism, Theonomy, censorship, or jihad.
Meanwhile, the perpetrators of the real jihad are mollycoddled by the media.
Or, every time a Christian attempts to shape the culture he is accused of being “worldly,” selling out, crossing over, etc.
Veith isn’t aiming to high as international standards and rankings reveal the heathens in Western Europe are far better educated and will supply most of the thinkers of the next century not to mention the rapid takeover of physics, math, computers etc by India and China. The fact that both the Europeans and Asians migrate to America to complete their education ensures that America will do fine but American Christianity will continue to struggle.
As for the media, the major players are fast becoming English speaking from elsewhere; comedians, newspaper owners, film stars, directors , animators from Canada; media moguls and movie stars from England and Australia.
American Christianity will lose the so-called culture war because of a narrow vision of the field of battle.
It would be nice if someone would refute Night Train here.
Only if you’re a masochist.
NT No, education isn’t the key to shaping culture in a nation like ours. The two biggest factors are, by far, the media and demographics.
In the long run it’s ideas not mere education and demography that shape a culture. Our present popular culture is the product of a combination of romanticism and philisophical naturalism that crept in from the 18th and 19th centuries, both of which have been found to be profoundly flawed. While the cultural heights of the media, academia, and film are presently occupied the devotees of these reigning ideas, the foundation of the structure has been found badly cracked.
The truths of Christianity and other orthodox religions are at present slowly but surely making a comeback. Read any of John Paul II’s or Benedict XVI encyclicals, subscribe to First Things, New Criterion, or read the documents produced by Evangelicals and Catholics Together and one can find ample reason for hope.
Speaking of hope, Benedict XVI has come up with a recent encyclical Spe Salvi based on Paul’s admonition in Romans SPE SALVI facti sumus”—in hope we were saved.
I pay scant attention to the doom sayers who see with the present cultural depredations the end of civilization. Christian Hope has been and will be in defiance of harsh cultural realities for millennia.
Way to go, Peter Leavitt
Veith makes a good point. The superior quality of Catholic schools, after all, is one of the reasons why Catholicism has become a cultural influence in once WASP-dominated North America.
But too few evangelicals value advanced education, particularly in more theory-oriented disciplines. I have a PhD in science and a JD — both from high-ranked schools. But in both programs, evangelicals were no more than about 5% (if not less) than the student body.
I agree that Christian schools and home-schools often do a better job at teaching basic skills than the typical public school. Thus, I meet lot of evangelicals who are accountants, engineers, computer programmers, and physicians. They’ve learned their basic skills well, and have become successful in careers where those skills are used heavily. But I meet few who are lawyers, artists, economists, or policy wonks. Hmmm.
As a breed, we evangelicals tend to prefer disciplines that are more fact-oriented than nuance-oriented. We like sharp boundaries between black and white, not shades of gray. But in this fallen world, we are often stuck with gray. Until we can train our kids to function in life’s shades of gray, our effect as salt and light will be limited.
I agree with Vieth. Media is a powerful means of conveying messages, be they healthy or not, but education is where the message is generated and cultivated.
As Christians, our love for learning must be as undying as it is unafraid. In the long run, if you love to learn, you’ll learn to love.
Night Train, I haven’t seen “celebration” of women in the military, and I have connections in a lot of places in the Christian world. I don’t mean “I know a lot of famous people,” but I know people in publishing, academics, radio, church life, home-schooling, etc. And in none of these circle are women in the military celebrated; their presence is frequently mourned.
I know a lot of Christians in the arts, by the way. It depends who you’re around, I guess. And two of the most conservative Christian colleges in America, Bob Jones and Pensacola, are very involved in the arts. (Bob Jones has an immense and valuable gallery of the masters–I’ve never seen it, but I hear it ranks with the best museums–and Pensacola is the place to study art.)
Breed! Breed! Breed!
New cheer at religious institutions of higher education. It’s always difficult to inspire young people to make the effort.
Vieth wrote, “[Our] current artistic and intellectual establishments—which have always before defined, built up, and transmitted our cultural heritage—have turned against it. Artists are attacking the very concept of beauty. Intellectuals are dismissing the intellect. Ethicists are denying morality. Those who used to pursue truth are now saying there is no such thing.”
Some fair generalizations, in my observation.
PETER LEAVITT wrote, “Christian Hope has been and will be in defiance of harsh cultural realities for millennia.”
True. And that is because Christian hope is ultimately rooted in a higher world, an eternal realm. But while our light should point people toward eternal levels of hope, there is still good reason to let some of Christ’s light shine on the culture to make its realities less harsh, if possible.
Doomsayers are a dime a dozen, but the fact remains, civilizations can and do die. And I mean ones that could have lived had they worked harder and smarter to remain healthy. And those civilizations that get sick, ruin a lot of lives and can crush a lot of eternal hope in the process.
So, let’s raise a love of learning among believers and live well under that love.
JoelMark Doomsayers are a dime a dozen, but the fact remains, civilizations can and do die. And I mean ones that could have lived had they worked harder and smarter to remain healthy.
True, Greece fell; Rome fell, as well as many other civilizations. It could be that Western civilization will fall due to the idol of material wealth and various forms of neo-Paganism, though, as long as there are devout Christians in the West, there is hope.
To me, Lincoln, who presided through the horror of the Civil War and concluded that God ultimately rules human affairs, give us much hope. Perhaps the most profound words in American history are the following from Lincoln’s Second Inaugural address:
“Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh.” If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman’s two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said “the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether.”
Well said, Peter.
Cheryl, you’ve missed the Sarah Rode Marine Diary posts? If the comments on there aren’t a celebration (except for me, NT and Marie, of course) what should we call it? It’s certainly not mourning.
Bianca,
Yep, I guess I’ve “missed” them. Or rather, I haven’t gone onto them, partly because military details aren’t of interest to me, and partly because no, I really don’t much like the idea of women in the military and wondered why a woman was chosen for that.
Cheryl D, I would suggest that you carefully review the Sarah Rode Marine diary. The Lord works in mysterious ways; In my view Sarah Rode, a devout Christian, has been called to be a Marine officer. In my view Bianca is hung up on a few passages of the Old Testament.
Well here is a theory for you and remember I come from an historical background on this. We have moved from a more service and labor intensive economy to a more “intelligent” economy. In the 1950’s when we had Brown V Board of Education it was not expected that all students would graduate. Those who didn’t could find a job doing some sort of labor. As we have moved from expecting 50% to 60 to 70 to 80 to 90 to (NCLB) 100% to graduate the education system has been dumbed down rather than brought up.
I remember being in my 3rd year of college before I thought I knew as much as my father (bookwise) who only has a 1957 high school diploma. My next door neighbor, Bill, who graduated in New Jersey in the 1930’s had to read Les Miserables IN THE ORIGINAL FRENCH and pass a test on it. We are doing a disservice to our children. I personally learned multiplication tables in 2nd grade (Christian school, only time I ever cheated on a test and picked the wrong person to cheat off of) my daughter is in 4th grade and they are just now doing their timed fact drills on multiplication. We should go back to the 1930’s 40’s and 50’s and teach a classical education to our children. My MASTERS degree isn’t earning me squat. I certainly wouldn’t put it up against Bill’s 1930’s era high school diploma. I barely read Les Mis in English.
I don’t aggre with NT’s conclusions. But I do agree that Vieth’s artilce is a self servicing, poorly warranted, and at best annecdotal waste of time.
Bianca,
I went to those posts and read or skimmed all her posts and most of the comments. I disagree with you that those posts prove strong support of women in the military within the Christian community.
1. There were actually a fairly large number of posts specifically disagreeing with women in the military, by a number of different people.
2. Many of the “supportive” posts were in fact saying personal things to her, like “Congratulations” or “I wish you the best,” not saying, “Wow, we need more women in the military.” There’s a real difference between saying, “Congratulations” and saying, “You have made the choice I would have recommended for you.”
3. Many people who basically disagree with women in the military, like me, probably never checked out those posts in the first place, or chose not to put any comments saying, “I disagree with your choice.” As a general rule in America, we might say, “I like your hair long and I hope you don’t cut it,” but we don’t say, “Oh, you cut your hair! I wish you hadn’t.” Likewise, if she’d asked for advice whether she should enter the military, more people probably would have recommended she not–but the decision has been made, and at that point most people don’t offer advice.
4. It’s not necessarily wrong in such a case to say, “I disagree with the choice you are making, and this is why,” but by no means is it necessary to do so. The biblical idea of older women teaching younger simply doesn’t mean women approaching younger women with whom they have no prior relationship and giving unsolicited advice. If called by God to do so, I won’t argue against it, but one’s “failure” to do so should not be construed as support.
5. She specifically points out the kinds of roles women are having–dealing with other women. I would argue that is best for that to be considered a civilian role (perhaps civilians trained by the military), but she is right that those are roles for women, not for men. That really does counteract to some extent whether or not she “should” be in the military. Again, I’d argue that those might best be non-military roles–but I’m not a military adviser and I have no knowledge of military affairs.
I presume she made this choice with the support of her family and her church. If she were to ask for opinions, I would give mine (even today, when I read the posts, I didn’t give my viewpoint on those threads). Since she did not ask for advice, and I have never met her, I did not give mine. That should not be construed as support, nor should the silence of the vast majority of World’s blog community.
There are really only two things that would improve the education dramatically.
One, quit disowning your children. History has shown that contributions from a very small minority have been way outside their tiny numbers in spite of everything Christians have done to hurt them. Nurture ALL of your children. Even those that weren’t born exactly the way you hoped they would be. Besides, you would be building stronger families, not tearing them apart.
Two, quit downing science. You go to the relevant article and what do they describe as “better educated”? Improvements in science and math. You can’t suggest to children that they study science and then turn around and tell them science is a lie. When you do that, you need both of your faces slapped.
RDean,
I’m not at all sure you know what you’re talking about half the time. On this subject, you surely don’t, but you have repeated it endlessly anyway.
#29: On this subject, you surely don’t, but you have repeated it endlessly anyway.
——You can’t be serious. The article states very close to what I say, only with illogical conclusions.
After building strong families, the surest tactic for winning the culture war is plain: Give your kids a better education than their secularist peers.
——You can’t build strong families when you disown your best and brightest.
Young people today are even worse at math and science. The cutting-edge math curriculum adopted as the standard in many states minimizes addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division and instead poses math problems like this: “If math were a color [or a food, or weather], it would be ____, because ____.” The decline of science education is evident in how few native-born Americans are pursuing degrees in technical fields, which are considered “too hard.”
——Like I said, if you include superstition in place of science, you will forever turn them away from good education.
The best-educated are invariably the leaders, the creators, and the shapers of culture.
——Absolutely true. And yet, many Christians call the brightest and best educated the “elite” and scoff and deride them. If you went to a doctor for surgery, you would want an elite doctor, you know, the “best”.
Today, our best-educated folk are mired in a nihilistic worldview, and they are dragging the rest of the culture down with them. But what if Christians took on this role?
——And this is just a flat out lie. The problem is with the Christians. Our best and brightest simply don’t believe in religion they way that you do. Many do believe there is a “higher being”, but not like the Christians who believe their God got a girl pregnant with himself and sometimes appeared as a dove or a burning plant. They know evolution to be a fact. They know the difference between a scientific theory and the word the religious hide behind. They know it’s a losing cause to educate people who are determined to remain ignorant. It’s this incessant push by the religious that is dragging the culture down. People need to THINK and FIGURE OUT PROBLEMS THAT EXIST TODAY. You can’t solve problems through discrimination and ignorance. Those just add to the problems.
I’m reading a book called Out of the Labyrinth, IIRC, now that describes the project a couple took on to do math education very differently, in a way that engages young minds and makes it pleasurable and inteesting to learn, they would even say, to create, math.
They call it Math Circles. Teachers, I recommend you read it.
We have people today teaching math who don’t consider themselves “good at math”, and certainly aren’t excited by it or love it, but math can be a joyful thing to do, not just drudgery of memorizing facts and methods.
The authors are Robert and Ellen Kaplan.
Nevertheless, on the education front, Christians are already winning victories in the culture war.
I’d like to see it but no examples are provided. I do see a lot of what is described in the paragraph before.
If your child is not challenged in school, whatever that may be, there is a problem.
The reason why young people avoid math and science is that they do not want to be labeled geeks.
#34: The reason why young people avoid math and science is that they do not want to be labeled geeks.
That is certainly part of the truth. If you watch movies in the thirties and forties, smart children were portrayed as “geeks”, just like today.
In the fifties, the Soviet Union put a satellite in orbit over the US. This caused an uproar in the US. The country was in danger. Everyone wanted his or her son or daughter to be a scientist. If you watch old episodes of “Leave it to Beaver” or “Father Knows Best”, or even movies, the kids always had a “Science Fair” project. Scientists in the movies were young, handsome and virile.
The US became the world leaders of technology.
That lead is slipping away.
Flash forward to now. You have those that want to add “supernatural” to the definition of “science”. When scientists talk about the possibility of “global warming” they are called liars or laughed at for not having all the answers. They are given names like geek and nerd.
And yet, whom do people look towards for solving the world’s problems. They may “pray” to some mysterious and unseen God. But they expect “answers from scientists and when the answers can’t be provided, they get angry.
Personally I avoided math and science in college because they were boring. I had taken the most advanced classes my high school offered (AP level classes) and they all seemed to amount to picking the right formula for the right problem and solving it. Except for chemistry, I aced them easily. (And I did get an A in the college-level chemistry course, I just had to work for it.) Doing that for a job sounded terribly monotonous.
I realize now that I probably could have enjoyed a career in science. (I have my doubts about math; my sister got a degree in math from RPI, but discovered there was little one could do with pure math without advanced degrees - today she is happily employed as a proofreader for a company that produces educational films.)
My 15-year-old son is in much the same position I was. He gets all A’s, but hasn’t heard of any type of career that particularly attracts him. He likes science well enough, but doesn’t have my husband’s passion for it.
He likes science well enough
Tell him to check out engineering. It’s like “project runway”. Designing equipment that people build and sell. You get to walk around it and say, I designed this and all those people built it. You end up supporting hundreds of working families. If you get a job in the right place, you are incredibly well respected.
there was little one could do with pure math without advanced degrees
If you can get through ten hours of Calculus and at least three more of Differential Linear Equations, you could become an actuary. Depending on the job, they travel and meet all kinds of people. They basically figure out insurance policy rates.
RDean,
Our father was an actuary (like his father before him), and both of us decided very early that we had no desire to follow in his footsteps. It could be just the company he worked for (since purchased by CIGNA), but he was always under tremendous pressure to get more work done. I don’t know if there was ever a night he didn’t bring work home. They eventually forced him to take an early retirement, saying he was no longer meeting quota. His explanation to us was that he was the senior member of the department, and as the most experienced he spent a good deal of time helping the junior members with work they were having trouble with, and management wasn’t taking that into account in regards to his productivity. He also suspected their goal was to bring in young people whom they could pay entry level salaries.
I’m not familiar with “project runway.” My son’s real love is music, but he realizes that it’s quite difficult to make a living as a performer, and he doesn’t think he could deal with young children well enough to teach. I’ve been encouraging to look at music technology, which would combine his interest in music and science.
Another debate coming?
RDEAN, do you believe in global warming?
It sounds that you might by the way you phrased your post. Just wondering…
Project Runway is a show about aspiring fashion designers. What not interested in the field, while “channel surfing” I watched and episode and marveled at how much these people loved what they were doing. They were only to happy to show it off. The same thing applies to engineering. Showing off a new piece of equipment would certainly give the same type of feeling of accomplishment.
RDEAN, do you believe in global warming?
Earth’s climate has changed. It’s dynamic and is always changing. We have historical proof of that. North polor ice caps are almost gone. Greenland glaciers are receding (whether that due to suspected global warming or the rise of magma under the ground, who knows?).
We need more study. Unfortunately, under this administration, nearly every top scientist has quit. This has been reported in science and engineering magazines for over the last 6 years. It seems they have been threatened by this administration to change their date to match administration policy.
date should be data