Youth Synod Bishops belittle homeschooling: ‘Are parents qualified?’

https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/youth-synod-bishops-belittle-homeschooling-are-parents-qualified ^

[KierkegaardMAN]

October 12, 2018 (CatholicCulture.org) – From Patrick Reilly of the Cardinal Newman Society, via the National Catholic Register, comes this ominous warning:

At the Youth Synod in Rome this week, one of the bishops' discussion groups made some disappointing and ignorant comments about Catholic homeschoolers. In one of the English-language discussion groups at the Synod, a summary of the conversation included these disturbing notes:

Home based schools – a model coming from America.

USA has many home schoolers – bishops in USA are not united, as homeschooling can have an ideological basis – kids may have special needs

are parents qualified to homeschool them? Let's answer that last question first. Yes, parents are qualified to teach their own children. In better times, Catholics could rely on their bishops to support the role of parents as "primary educators."

Why is it, then, that the "bishops in USA are not united" in support of home schoolers? The note is chilling in its answer to that obvious question; the bishops of English-language Circle C referred to "an ideological basis." As Patrick Reilly points out, liberal opponents of home schooling regularly use that term to disparage the home-schooling movement. The "ideological" label, Reilly remarks, is "what faithful Catholic home schoolers endure frequently from fellow Catholics, priests and even bishops – the charge that they are too 'conservative' and too 'moralistic.'"

[wintertime]

Re: Lazy and incompetent parents

I occasionally get this question or response.

My answer:

The lazy and incompetent are the **most** likely to institutionalize their kids. The lazy and incompetent are the least likely to homeschool.

I also add that homeschooling is the healthiest and most natural way to rear robust children into successful adulthood. Yes, some children will need to be institutionalized for their children for their schooling. We need orphanages, too, but no one claims this is the best environment for a child.

[foundedonpurpose]

Are Bishops qualified to tell us how to raise our children?

The Bible states that we should “Train up a child in the way he should go;
even when he is old he will not depart from it.”

[Tired of Taxes]

The reason is simple: They want us to send our children to Catholic schools.
Many Catholic schools have been losing students, closing down, and merging.
They can’t compete with public schools, which have monopolized the education system.

Unfortunately, Catholic school tuition is too high. And Catholic universities tend to be very expensive.

I would’ve gladly sent all of mine to Catholic schools and later to Catholic colleges, even when we weren’t believers.
But we couldn’t afford the tuition.

[DoodleBob]

It is vital to keep in mind that the Catechism of the Church states clearly that Parents have the first responsibility for the education of their children. This is an unqualified truism that a note from some politically-stacked Synod of bishops etc cannot change. Keep in mind, the people at this gathering are generally from the liberal wing of the church - a sort of Catholic Church Deep State. These guys have as much standing on these matters as Nancy Pelosi has on foreign policy.

In truth there ARE churches and even archdioceses in the US that are supportive of HSing - Mrs DoodleBob and I encountered this during our HSing adventures. To be sure, there are also plenty of people who don't get it; a priest in the 1990s suggested we get more "contemporary" (read: liberal) educational material (we used the Baltimore Catechism). Many HSers from the 1960s-1980s forged a path that made it easier for GenX and other later HSers. Today's opposition shouldn't be taken any less lightly. But context is important, because you can't fight every battle. This Synod is a pimple on the face of HSing opposition.

I don't doubt many liberals - religious or otherwise - view HSers as "the enemy" for the same reason Deplorables strike fear into the hearts of statists: we stand as the living embodiment of rebels who Won't Go Quietly Into the Night (and we are usually heavily armed).

Like anything good in life, you have to work at it and you will find all sorts of roadblocks or even enemies along the way. While it's a shame there are so many confused Church bureaucrats on this topic, we always have God and Truth in our side.

Just like our God-given right to keep and bear arms cannot be removed by a Supreme Court opinion, the fundamental right - nay, responsibility - of the parent to the education of their children cannot be eradicated by some new pronouncement. Interpreting these notes as THE OFFICIAL CATHOLIC STANCE ON HOMESCHOOLING is akin to using the Obama Admin's stance on guns as the official US interpretation of the Second Amendment. Caveat emptor.

[jimfree]

Socialists hate home-schooling, apparently. This, even though home-school moms (and a few dads) demonstrate how a cooperative can really work.

[Mrs. Don-o]

We home-schooled both of our boys, and got respect and recognition from our parish, which offered parish resources for our Catholic Homeschool Parents support group. Our bishop and the Diocesan Formation people down at the chancery were also helpful, and continue to be so.

So don't take the cluelessness of some of the clergy as indicative of the whole Catholic community. I am confident you wouldn't want to make an unfair generalization.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Our homeschooling had nothing to do with a reaction against pedophile priests. It was supported by our priests and based on the Catholic doctrine that parents are children's first and most fundamental educators.

Just thought you'd want to know.

[MayflowerMadam]

I know many families that home school. Some are beyond excellent, and some are so dreadful it’s technically child neglect.

[Mrs. Don-o]

We were taught, per Catholic doctrine, that just as the family is n "ecclesiola" (a little church, the Domestic Church) our families are also little schools.

We do this because of Catholicism, not despite it.

As with any large community, you'll find a spectrum of opinions. But the doctrine couldn't be clearer.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Maybe we're lucky that the Catholic parochial school idea in the USA was essentially an expansion of the work of St. Elizabeth Seton, who as wife, and later widow, educated her own kids at home, and then established (at the behest of Bishop John Naumann) a parish school which was, in a sense, an expansion of her homeschooling.

I myself am the product of 12 years of Catholic schooling (perhaps that explains a lot!) but my husband and I home-schooled: not because of opposition to our parish school, which we saw as excellent and which we (on the low end of the income spectrum) had been offered for free.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I question that. As far as I know, Catholic schools receive -0- dollars, -0- in goods, services, or money from city, county, state and feds.

Explain to me how homeschooling "costs" the Catholic school's funding.

Links, please.

[Mrs. Don-o]

You ought not to write loose defamatory generalizations like that. You may not realize this, anmd I’m sure it’s not your intention, but it makes you sound like a bigot.

[browniexyz]

Hello, Mrs. Don-o,

I love that you truly think the Catholic schools are completely independent from federal, state, and local control and monies. That is so 1950s of you.
You don’t know Catholic schools receive money from the feds through the “Blue Ribbon” program (Dept of Ed) for teaching in accordance with federal Common Core standards, and the “Green Ribbon” program, through the Department of Environmental Protection (for teaching kids about the dying polar bears)? Unless Betsy DeVos has been busy, these were in place last I checked.

Our Catholic diocese told us homeschooling parents that we cost the diocese when we teach our kids at home — that’s tuition money they are missing out on (and those schools are TOO PRICEY if you have more than two kids).

And your imperious demands for “Links, please?” Sorry. I have way too much work on my plate on a rainy Sunday to do your research for you.

You probably think Catholic health care is “charitable”, too, and that the hospitals don’t take a cent in Medicare and Medicaid funds. Sadly, they do, and there are plenty of strings attached!! Including performing abortions.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I didn't speak of Catholic Charities, Migration & Refugee Service, Caritas International, healthcare or any of the other arms of Church activities which have been essentially made agents of the State. I was speaking of parochial schools.

Since ours do not participate in Common Core, we haven't had the complication of using taxpayer-funded texts or teacher-retraining.

However, you have not shown that per-capita subsidies are given to Catholic schools based on enrollment, which was, I think, your point.

But if you haven't any links, I certainly understand.

[Mrs. Don-o]

P.S. I don’t see how “Links, please” is imperious. When I’m intrested learning, I commonly ask for links. I give them, too, without objection.

[bboop]

Would that the whole bunch of them would just GO. But no! They have to comment on Climate Change, the price of lettuce, immigration, President Trump. Honest to Goodness. (Catholic Convert here/ face palm).

[browniexyz]

I am not going to do your research for you, Mrs. Don-o.

And you are flat wrong if you think my point was that “per-capita subsidies are given to Catholic schools based on enrollment”, which I never stated, and was NOT my point. You made that up.

My point is that in many dioceses, in order to attract and/or keep enrollment, Catholic Schools now DISPLAY, prominently, the federal seal of the United States, because they have “achieved” Blue Ribbon status by changing their curriculum to fit the federal requirements and you can find plenty of “links” to that everywhere.

[Mrs. Don-o]

You made the assertion that the Catholic system loses tax subsidy for every child who leaves a Catholic school to homeschool. That would mean that Catholic schools receive a tax benefit on a per-student basis. You asserted this dubious claim with no evidence.

Since you are either unwilling or unable to produce such evidence, your repeated refusal suggests you have little or no foundation for your claim.

The problem here is not that I didn’t “do my homework,” but your failure to support your assertion.

If you could do so, I would certainly be open to your argument.

[Mrs. Don-o]

BTW, I am a homeschooler and also principled critic of any entanglement of Church institutions with taxpayer money. I strongly lobbied my diocese against Common Core. I know for a fact that our parish school does not lose public subsidy $$$ for every child who homeschools, because there are no public subsidy dollars in our parochial school’s operating budget.

[browniexyz]

I don’t know what to say to this puzzling attack.

You claim that I claim something I never claimed.

As a homeschooler, I was attacked by the Catholic diocese for threatening the health of the school system. Yes, that happened.

And now...this... from you!