Duty to Youth

All praise was given to the Catholic Church for the religious training which it gives its children.

There was a dinner at the National Republic Club, Manhattan. Nathan Krass, famed rabbi, made an impassioned appeal for unity among Catholics, Protestants and Jews to foster religious instruction. Said he: "The one great church in America that has done its duty (in this respect) is the Catholic Church." Whereupon Ernest Stires, famed P. E. rector of St. Thomas, said that criticism of the parochial school system of the Catholic Church by non-Catholics should be deferred until other churches had done as much for religious education.

Here is the Rabbi's thesis: "We can't have a common religion in the common public schools. We can't have a priest, minister and rabbi visit each school, for to do so would be to segregate the children into groups in an institution in which they should not be divided. The purpose of the public schools is to make for a political democracy. We cannot bring a divisive force into the public schools.

"Children should receive religious instruction under the auspices of the Church to which each child belongs. That's where the Catholic Church has set the example. Let us arrange with the Government to arrange the schedules of the public schools so that each student may have an hour or an hour and a half daily for religious instruction, and let the Protestant and Jewish churches provide this instruction. Then we will have done our duty."