A lot can change depending on whether you focus on sight or hearing. When I teach Plato’s Republic, we spend weeks discussing whether beauty is real or not. Our students generally regard themselves as counter-cultural. They will tell you they utterly reject the moral relativism and atheism that they see in the broader society beyond their family and community. And yet they will always say, with remarkable confidence, that “beauty is completely subjective; it’s in the eye of the beholder.”
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What is the purpose of our leisure? This question has been simmering in my mind since I first encountered the idea of schole several years ago. It’s a lovely concept, particularly appealing to us homeschool moms whose days are typically busy, demanding, and, if we are not careful, chaotic. Many of us are thus inspired to order our days around a “liturgy,” implementing periods of work and rest in the pattern of our weeks and years and sharing in a “feast” of good books, music, and art with our children, and all are good and noble pursuits.
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Proverbs 26:4 says, “Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.” The very next verse says, “Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit.”
The whiplash while reading wisdom literature like this often leaves one wondering what she ought to do. Do I answer the fool, or don’t I? The answer, of course, is this: It all depends. Sometimes, both happen at the same time.
In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, we get some good samples of folly.
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The one thing that secular and classical Christian education has in common is the dismissal of lecturing. Could it be, however, that the problem isn’t lecturing? Maybe the problem is bad lectures. Lots of bad lectures. Not just bad lectures delivered by bad lecturers, but dreadfully bad. Duller than “on hold” music. Dryer than dehydrated jerky. More monotone than the guy at the funeral parlor.
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Growing up, I was the kid who was at church “every time the doors were opened.” Since my Christian school was a ministry of our church, my school and church schedules never conflicted, and I never had to choose between two masters. Wednesdays were “no homework nights” because everyone was expected to be at the mid-week services. The family schedule deferred to the church calendar, meaning that Sunday worship, mid-week services, and volunteer service in ministries were non-negotiables.
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Imagine that you are entering a classroom for the first time. The first images you take in are speaking to your soul in a subconscious way. Immediately your senses are sending messages about the learning that will take place in that classroom. The learning atmosphere is being set before any actual content is taught. For most people it is a natural process to adjust to our daily surroundings and in turn become numb to the messages that the atmosphere of a classroom is sending.
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Like pallbearers they each took a corner of the mat upon which I lay. Into the nave of the chapel the liturgists of the church triumphant bore me, beckoning me: “Say these words . . . See this symbol . . . Receive these blessings . . . Eat this bread . . . Drink this wine.” Another typical Sunday in which I am escorted into the presence of the One who is the Resurrection and the Life. There at His bidding, by His grace, and in His Spirit He grants me to rise and walk.
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I love George Herbert’s The Temple—the major hits, the b-sides, everything. The more I read Herbert’s work, the more I realize just how inventive it really is. Take even a minor poem like “Paradise” for example. Like so many works by Herbert, this one is a little Matryoshka doll of meaning—a highly intricate artifact containing successive, hidden surprises.
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As the school year gets underway, I would like to offer a suggestion for the end of the school year. Maybe, with enough time to look ahead, teachers and homeschooling parents will have a chance to add this suggestion to the curriculum of one class or another if they don’t use it already. I want to make a case for arguably the greatest speech in American political history. One that, while it is already recognized, is still massively underrated in terms of structure and import.
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I bought a wooden sign at Hobby Lobby the other day. I was actually there to purchase a single picture frame to showcase some of my daughter’s school art work when I noticed a fifty percent off sale sign for all of the wall hangings. Needless to say, I got lost in the aisle. Actually, I got lost in the beautiful words. Each of the signs beckoned to me with their varied sappy and sacred phrases.
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