Editorial

Religious literacy: why not a national inquiry?

Michael Gilchrist

Contents - Dec 2004 - Buy a copy now Editorial: Religious literacy: why not a national inquiry? - Michael Gilchrist US and Australian election results: the cultural revolution challenged - Michael Gilchrist News: The Church Around the World Gone fishing: Catholic Earthcare Australia adopts discredited Green agenda - Pat Byrne Administration: Cardinal Pell: Church administrators must put Christ's mission first - Cardinal George Pell English language: Will Rome ensure the completion of an improved Mass translation? - William Oddie Liturgy: Redemptionis Sacramentum on the liturgical rights of the faithful - CDF New Evangelisation: Rebuilding a lost Faith - Fr John Walter Archbishop Fulton Sheen: 25th anniversary - Martin Tobin Society: American surveys show advantages of sexual abstinence education Letters: Orthodoxy succeeds (letter) - Fr Adrian Head Letters: Seminary reforms (letter) - Fr Peter Thompson CM Letters: Election result (letter) - Maureen Federico Letters: Liturgical development (letter) - Msgr Peter J. Elliott Letters: Catholic youth (letter) - Robert Denahy Letters: Graham Greene a Catholic? (letter) - Malcolm Mackinnon Letters: Mass translation (letter) - Leo McManus Letters: 'Fem-speak' (letter) - C.V.Phillips Letters: Misunderstanding over 'Come As You Are' (letter) - Peter Hannigan Letters: Call to holiness (letter) - Mark Calleja Letters: Abortion (letter) - Maryse Usher Letters: Nihilism (letter) - Robert Prinzen-Wood Poetry: The Salami Treatment - Bruce Dawe Books: Decoding Da Vinci, by Amy Welborn - Anthony Cappello (reviewer) Books: Theology of the Church, by Cardinal Charles Journet - Michael Gilchrist (reviewer) Books: Making Sense of Private Revelations, by Fr Paul Newton - Msgr Peter J. Elliott Books: Architects of the Culture of Death, by Donald DeMarco and Benjamin Wiker - Jodie Brown (reviewer) Books: Inspiring Christmas Gifts Reflection: Today is born to us a Saviour of the world - Pope John Paul II

Federal Minister for Education Dr Brendan Nelson recently announced the setting up of a national inquiry into the way reading is being taught in Australian primary schools.

The child-centred approach, which has held sway for the past 30 years, has come under increasing criticism for contributing to widespread illiteracy, with as many as one-third of today's secondary school students unable to read or write at an acceptable level.

A similar situation prevails in mathematics, history and geography.

Perhaps the Catholic Church should take a leaf out of Dr Nelson's book, with the launching of its own national inquiry into the religious literacy and practice levels among Catholics and how any deficiencies might be remedied.

The best available research (notably that of Br Marcellin Flynn) highlights the failure of the 1970s child-centred, experiential catechetical methods that even today remain in favour in some Church circles.

With less than five per cent of Catholic school-leavers at weekly Mass, the Church's crisis is of far greater magnitude than the State's.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church has been available for over ten years, but its effective utilisation has been very uneven, aside from the new RE texts currently used in Melbourne, Sydney and a few other dioceses. And while knowledge of the faith does not guarantee practice, it is a good start.

The approach to RE needs to be national, rather than merely diocese by diocese. A unified initiative from the Bishops' Conference is urgently needed to overcome the entrenched outdated habits of thinking still prevailing.

Time is running out, with the continued greying of the Mass-attending population. Moreover, even among those who do attend, there is much ignorance of Catholic moral teachings, sacramental requirements and liturgy. An open and thorough inquiry, to which all sections of the Church are invited to contribute, may help clarify how the present disastrous and worsening situation can be effectively addressed.

• Michael Gilchrist, Editor, E-mail: mtg@netconnect.com.au

Reprinted from AD2000 Vol 17 No 11 (December 2004 - January 2005), p. 2