New Church Life May/Jun 2014 | Page 10

n e w c h u r c h l i f e : m ay / j u n e 2 0 1 4 Schools and Bryn Athyn College. The General Church sees education as “an essential element in our spiritual development.” The “core purpose” of the Secondary Schools is “to prepare students for principles and useful lives in this world and the next.” Part of the mission of the College is for its religion-based education to “challenge students to develop spiritual purpose” in their lives. In his iconic book on New Church education – Education for Use – Bishop Willard D. Pendleton spoke of “the need for an educational system which recognizes that the ultimate welfare of society is dependent upon the cultivation of a moral and spiritual conscience in the individual.” New Church education is unique in teaching the spiritual person within each of us, as well as the natural, and in developing that spiritual conscience. It recognizes that our spiritual life needs every bit of nurturing and guidance that we devote to our natural lives. Every day new crises, tragedies and misfortune erupt in the world, but we don’t always perceive the spiritual causes at the root. That is the great challenge of our civilization. We need practical answers for what plagues us – but spiritual context and spiritual solutions. New Church education is important because it is about wisdom, not just intelligence. The beginning of wisdom is the acknowledgment of the Lord. It is knowing right from wrong, good from evil, and being guided by Divine truth. Without that clear vision, values diffuse into a kaleidoscope of confused opinions, and we live with the fallout. The erudite Norman Cousins wrote in his book Human Options in 1981: “The ultimate test of education is whether it makes people comfortable in the presence of options; which is to say, whether it enables them to pursue their possibilities with confidence. Similarly, a society can be judged according to the number and range of options of consequence it opens to its people.” That is what traditional education does: prepares students to make good choices in this world. New Church education also prepares students to be comfortable and confident with their spiritual choices – the most critical they will make for their lives and for the world. We like to say that New Church education is preparation for heaven. It really prepares students to make the choices that lead to heaven – and those are spiritual choices. New Church education doesn’t make students better than anyone else; it just increases the opportunities to think from a spiritual perspective and to extend positive influence into the world. There are many good, spiritual people all around us, with both moral and spiritual conscience. We are not alone. There are many candles probing the darkness, but only one true light. It is for all of us who see that light to reflect it throughout our lives. (“Let your light so shine before men that they see your good works, and glorify your 218