The School of Caesar: Christian Worldview and Humanism

As promised from an earlier post called The School of Caesar: Introduction, here are more nuggets worth noting from the DVD series titled  The Children of Caesar, in which Voddie Baucham, Jr takes a refreshing look at education in America, and what the Bible says about educating our children in light of His word.

It is said that if you want to know a person’s worldview, look at how they live.  Here are some statistics on the matter:

• Less than ten percent of American Christians possess a biblical worldview.
• Two-thirds of born-again Christians assert there is no such thing as absolute truth.
• Four out of ten said they are committed to the Christian faith.
• Some will say, “What is right for me may not be right for another in a given situation.”
• 85% of church youth agree with this statement, which is in line with relativism or situational ethics.
• 62% of youth agree with this statement: “Nothing can be known for certain except the things that you experience in your life.”

Cornelius Van Til wrote:

“Non-Christian education puts the child in a vacuum.  The result is that child dies.  Christian education alone really nurtures personality, because it alone gives the child air and food.  Modern educational philosophy gruesomely insults our God and our Christ.  How, then, do you expect to build anything positively Christian or theistic upon a foundation which is the negation of Christianity and Theism?  No teaching of any sort is possible except in Christian schools.”

Charles Hodge also said:

“It is a fact that unless children are brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, they, and the society which they constitute or control, will go to destruction. Consequently, when a state resolves that religious instruction shall be banished from the schools and other literary institutions, it virtually resolves on self-destruction.”

Now compare the aforementioned quotes to these below which speak of secular humanism.  All are quoted by signers of the Humanist Manifesto:

Paul Blanchard said:

“I think the most important factor moving us toward a secular society has been the educational factor. Our schools may not teach Johnny to read properly, but the fact that Johnny is in school until he is 16 tends to lead toward the elimination of religious superstition. The average high school child acquires a high school education, and this militates against Adam and Eve and all other myths of alleged history. When I was one of the editors of The Nation in the twenties, I wrote an editorial explaining that golf and intelligence were the two primary reasons that men did not attend church. Perhaps today I would say golf and a high school diploma.”

Joel Burnette said:

“Public education is the parochial education of scientific humanism.”

Now for a more visual illustration of where the Christian worldview stands, study this graphic below.  It is derived from the Nehemiah Institute Peers Test.  It is very telling about the dependencies of education in light of a believers worldview.

In my next and final post on the findings I’ve gathered from the DVD series titled  The Children of Caesar, I’ll discuss homeschooling as the biblical choice for Christian families across America.