The Emptiness of Education

Over and above the world of sounds and visible things, over and above the world even of science and philosophy, there is that still greater environment of life, truth, love, and beauty which is God, Who alone can satisfy the infinite aspirations of man. One of the sad and regrettable things in education is that there are some people in this world who are dead not only to the world of poetry, music, philosophy, but dead to the life and love of God, and that class we may call the "Deity-blind." This group is alive to the environment of what might be called a progressive world; its words are correct, its sense of propriety shows itself in the embellishment of homes and the choice of amusements; it is wordly; it is rich; it is sophisticated; it is successful; it is at ease; it is honored; it has eyes, but they are blind - blind to the beautiful environment of God and the Incarnate life of Christ.

The very existence of this class, even in educated circles and university life, should give us pause and make us ask questions as to whether or not we are educated, in the right and true sense of the term. It is the growing mass of Deity-blind in our American life that prompts me to submit these questions:

Are the schools and universities throughout the country that ignore God really educating the young men and women entrusted to their care? Would we say that a man was a learned mathematician if he did not know the first principles of Euclid? Would we say that a man was a skilled litterateur if he did not know the meaning of words? Would we say that a man was a profound physicist if he did not know the first principles of light, sound, and heat? Can we say that a man is truly educated who is ignorant of the first principles of life and truth and love - which is God? I submit that a little child who tonight is kneeling at the knee of a foreign missionary sister, and learning for the first time that God made the sun, the moon, and stars that shine down upon her, and that some day she will render an account to Him as her loving Lord - that child, I say, is a more profound philosopher, a wiser scholar, a mind more entitled to university degrees, than all of our gowned professors scattered through the length and breadth of this land who know not that beyond time is the Timeless, that beyond space is the Spaceless, the infinite Lord and Master of the universe ... to be continued

From "Education and the Deity-Blind" in Old Errors and New Labels by Fulton J Sheen