Bible Can’t Patch Moral Holes
WE HAVE witnessed in the past few weeks an exchange of letters about returning biblical studies in our schools, in the hope of restoring vanishing moral values of the youth.
The secularists feel that such a move would be discriminatory towards those of other faiths and, therefore, everything should be taught under the general umbrella of religious studies. It is a serious issue that this society is falling apart in every area and not just in a socio-economic way, as some would have us believe.
This is a crumbling civilisation, dying before it has reached maturity. We can fight the reintroduction of the Bible all we want and we can advocate for it.
To be frank, I don’t think that having the Bible taught in schools will bring back morality and I fear, that if this is the purpose of reintroducing it, we will be supporting an oppressive structure. To introduce the Bible as a tool to moralise our youth will only create a society of people who are moral out of downright fear.
Considering that morality is vanishing, do we think that school is the right place to begin? Do we think that giving the duty of instilling morality in our youth should go to teachers in the classroom? Where are the parents? Isn’t home supposed to be the place where moral values are first instilled in children and school is simply a place of guardianship?
Unless parents begin to play the role parents ought to, the introduction of the Bible is not going to change their children. Let’s stop patching moral holes and do our part instead of looking for magical fixes.
God has given parents the duty to raise their children, not the schools. This is not a matter of religion and secularism, it’s about righting the wrongs which are in our homes. We can’t expect that the child we fail to discipline at home will be an angel in public by simply by teaching him the Bible. Miracles do happen, but that’s why they are called miracles, because they don’t happen every day. Therefore we should use our parental duties to bring up children who will be responsible citizens in the various spheres of life.
Basilius M Kasera
Windhoek