Losing one's mother naturally makes a person reflect on the really important things. The author was reminded that when faced with the Great Question, which even the best schools cannot handle competently, all other questions can seem trivial, and it's tempting to back away from them. But the "lesser" questions schools mishandle can have a terrible…

Most of us who are parents would pay an attorney a lot of money to prevent the unjust incarceration of one of our children in a confined space with psychopaths, wouldn't we? So just why are we paying the government a lot of money to unjustly incarcerate nearly all of our children in confined spaces with psychopaths? Most of us try hard to stay…

As amply documented by "evangelical/liberal" Jim Wallis in his new "God's Politics", any country can be profoundly improved by voices of faith, hope, and love whose appeals are to reason, conscience, and civility, and who have avoided the entrapments of partisanship. Among such voices have been those of Martin Luther King, Desmond Tutu, Mohandas…

"What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem? What concord is there between the Academy and the Church?" According to third-century Christian apologist Tertullian, not much. From precisely the opposite perspective, the twentieth-century "secular humanist" John Dewey would have echoed Tertullian, although he was as greatly indebted to Christian…

For teachers and schools and schoolchildren, the politics of education is a no-win situation. Public schools serve public purposes. That mission makes them political, so the interests of the children and teachers are at best secondary. This document explores the author's opinion about teacher educators and their default into the hands of the…

Argues that teachers should reconsider practices that could inhibit development of faith. Explicates the curriculum of 12th-century abbot Richard of St. Victor, suggesting that it synthesizes intellect and affect, reason and revelation, and poses challenges for public education. (SK)