Tag: biblical worldview

Preserving the Inheritance: Christian Education in the Post-Christian West

In The Air We Breathe (The Good Book Company, 2022), author Glen Scrivener explains how western society came to believe in the core values we now take for granted: equality, compassion, consent, enlightenment, science, freedom, and progress. He contends that belief in these values is not self-evident, trans-cultural, or historically necessary. So where did these values come from? His answer: Christianity.  It is a great irony, therefore, that even while western society continues to secularize, leaving belief in the Christian faith behind, its moral instincts remain largely unchanged. Westerners do not question the existence of human rights. Nor do they

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The Goal of School Education

What is the goal of school education? This is a foundational question that demands an answer. Organizations are complex entities with moving and disparate parts. Schools are no exception. Facilities, insurance, safety, technology, admissions, marketing, communications, and development are all essential functions of school operations, and I have yet to even mention academics. Each department of the school must be aligned toward a singular purpose, what we call the school’s mission. This mission must answer the question: What is the goal of school education? To consider a response, let us turn to philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff (b. 1932), whom I have

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Paul’s School of Mentorship

Classical school leaders often emphasize the centrality of mentorship in the educational process, particularly in grades 6-12. They have wisely observed that the junior high and high school years are a pivotal phase in a person’s development. As students gradually spend more time with peers in settings without their parents, small yet formative opportunities emerge for these students to make decisions for themselves. Overtime, these decisions will form nothing less than their personality and character. Thus, the presence of wise and intentional mentors who can offer advice to these students becomes all the more crucial. In a similar way, the

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Towards a Philosophy of Nature Study

And God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth.” And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. Genesis 1:11-12 (ESV) Our modern world does not know what to do with nature. As a result, neither do our schools. For some, nature is a victim of humanity, a primordial entity (Mother

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Why Gender Matters in Education

We often take for granted the givenness of the world we live in, that is, the things in life that are not questionable. For example, I have never questioned that the sky is blue or that I am the son of my parents. These aspects of reality strike me as matter of fact and have served as two axioms among many upon which my mind has built its picture of reality. While these beliefs may not be foundational in the strictest philosophical sense, they are close enough to the foundation that I form subsequent beliefs about reality around them. For

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Love the Lord Your God With All Your Mind

And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How do you read it?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.”  And he said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.”  Luke 10:25-28 ESV What does it mean to love God? How are we to

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Funding the Mission: Values for Fundraising in Christian, Classical Schools

At Educational Renaissance, we seek to promote a rebirth of ancient wisdom for the modern era. We believe that education is so much more than getting good grades, receiving admission to prestigious universities, and fulfilling state requirements. To be sure, evaluation is productive, higher education is valuable, and scripture grants government an important role in maintaining an orderly society. But these goals taken individually fall short of beholding the grander purpose of education. What is this purpose? Education is about coming alongside students made in God’s image and helping them achieve their God-given potential. It begins with the question, “Who

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Apprenticeship in the Arts, Part 6: The Transcendence and Limitations of Artistry

In this series on apprenticeship in the arts we have laid out a vision for the role of the arts in a fully orbed classical Christian education. We began by situating artistry or craftsmanship within a neo-Aristotelian and distinctly Christian purpose of education: namely, the cultivation of moral, intellectual, and spiritual virtues. Then we explored the analogy between artistry and morality through the basis in habit development, including in our purview the revolution in neurobiology regarding the importance of myelin. We saw that some types of elite performance have more established pathways to excellence, allowing for deliberate practice, while moral

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Liberal Arts and the Transmission of Culture

In classical circles, we speak often about the importance of the liberal arts, over and against mere career-readiness skills, but we do not always elaborate. The reality is that career-readiness skills–skills like analyzing data, applying information technology, preparing for an interview, and completing tasks efficiently–are immensely helpful. The problem is not their usefulness, but their limitations. Career-readiness skills fail to lead students outside the realm of function and into the world of value and meaning. What our world needs today more than anything is not faster internet or a new task-management system, but better stories injected with purpose. Telling better

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Cultivating the Discipline of Study

Our world is restless, this much is clear. As I have observed in previous blogs, the speed of the modern world is only accelerating as new technologies allow people to access whatever they seek at unprecedented rates. Surfing the web, in particular, has never been easier, and with it, the vulnerability to succumb to the siren’s song of amusement. Amusement is a passive state of entertainment. At its core, it is a form of distraction. People seek amusement when they are bored, when they seek to delay or avoid more difficult tasks, or when they have simply grown habituated to

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