Self-aware Christians know that, "there ain't no neutral ground". Christians are more likely to be epistemologically self-aware. They know that all truth is pre-interpreted truth. It is pre-interpreted by God the creator and sustainer of all things. Anyone who argues there can be such a thing as a neutral zone--a secular public square, for example--where all views are held with equal respect and have equal validity is either self-deceived, childishly credulous or a snake.
The same reality holds in schools. Secular schools that are even-handed, and tolerant towards all beliefs and religions, gods, and speculations are a nonsense. At base, the secularists who make such claims, know it is spurious. But it feels good. It is a just-so story they tell themselves to maintain a veneer of self-respect and to fool their opponents.
Christians are liberated from such self-deceits. If all truth is pre-interpreted truth, as the Christian faith insists is the case, then everyone is pre-committed and biased to a particular world-view from the outset--either Christian or otherwise. When it comes to schooling, Christians want schools that are independent of the secularist world-view and able fully to reflect the authority of the Word of God as the pre-interpretion all other truth, reality, and knowledge. In New Zealand, the only way to achieve this is to have truly private schools, self-funded. If the secularist government pays, eventually the secularist government will control the music its hired piper plays.
When the Conservative government in the UK set about to reform British schools, it adopted a quasi-market model which was designed to introduce competition into the education market place.
This in turn led to an opening up of the competitive marketplace. A thousand flowers would be allowed to bloom. Some would succeed, some would fail. The good schools would end up putting competitive pressure on the establishment schools, resulting in raising standards for all.
There was one slight problem. Free schools could do anything they liked, teach anything they liked--provided they conformed to the prevailing secularist anti-Christian ideology. Consequently, the government inspection agency is now actively closing down Christian schools. Here are a couple of examples of the government's pre-commitments to its secularist ideology:
The government's "diversity agenda" is pop-speak for multi-culturalism, which, in its turn, is pop-speak for secularism in its post-modern phase of the spin cycle. All truths are relative and a legitimate perspective of the holder. Consequently, a tolerant society is one which holds no prejudicial views on any other competing perspective. Except, that the secularist definition of tolerance most certainly cannot be challenged; it is absolutely correct and to ignore it is Verboten. Behold the self-deceit and hypocrisy of secularism.Christian School Forced to Close
As Inspectors Brand Children ‘Bigots’ for Not Knowing What a Muslim Is
Inspectors have labelled pupils at a Christian school bigots and forced it to close after a young boy gave the wrong answer when asked what a Muslim was. Teachers at the school say he referenced terrorism in his answer, but argued that one child’s throwaway answer was no ground for closing the whole school.
Durham Free School, which currently educates 94 pupils aged between 11 and 13, was praised by former education secretary Michael Gove when it opened in September 2013, the Daily Mail has reported.
But inspectors visiting the school last November, after the new guidelines encouraging inspectors to rate schools on how they promote ‘British values’, deemed the school to have failed on a wide range of factors. “Standards are low and progress is inadequate. Students’ achievement is weak”, inspectors wrote.
The school will now close at Easter as the current education secretary, Nicky Morgan has withdrawn funding. But teachers say that they were unfairly penalized for placing a Christian ethos at the heart of the school by inspectors who wanted to demonstrate that they were promoting the Government’s diversity agenda. In their report, the schools inspectors concluded: “Leaders are failing to prepare students for life in modern Britain. Some students hold discriminatory views of other people who have different faiths, values or beliefs from themselves.”
The secularist establishment is declaring it will tolerate pretty much all views, regarding education and curriculum in "free schools" except the Christian faith. The only kind of "Christianity" the secular establishment will tolerate is one which submits itself, and conforms to, secularist pre-interpretations of everything. Therefore, from the outset, everything in "free schools" must conform to the overarching ethical imperialism of the secular world. This is the same dynamic which led successive Roman emperors to say, "Of course you can worship Jesus, if only you first bow in adoration to Caesar and offer incense to him."
Here is another example of a militant secularist religion producing persecution of a UK Christian school:
Meanwhile, nearby Grindon Hall, another Christian school, has been placed in special measures despite achieving the best school leaving exam results in the area. The school’s head, Chris Gray, made an official complaint to inspection group Ofsted following their most recent inspection, in which pupils were asked whether they knew what lesbians did, and whether their friends felt trapped in the wrong body. The line of questioning angered parents, with one mother reporting that her daughter was “disturbed” and “upset” by the “wholly inappropriate” manner of questions asked.The "British values" regime is actually a front for militant secular atheism. We Christians will not be surprised. It's expected. Militant secular atheism has naturally pre-interpreted all reality after its own image--as all creatures do. The only "Christianity" that will be tolerated and accepted is a hollowed out religion which has likewise pre-interpreted reality in terms of the secularist worldview. And that is just not going to happen. Christians fear God, who can destroy both body and soul in hell, before they fear the State, which can merely kill the body.
Mr Gray also drew attention to a paragraph present in the draft report, which was subsequently omitted from the final report issued, which read: “The Christian ethos of the school permeates much of the school’s provision. This has restricted the development of a broad and balanced approach to the curriculum.” He said the statement revealed “unwarrented skepticism on the part of the inspection team” regarding the Christian ethos of the school. . . .
Colin Hart, Director of The Christian Institute, responded to Mr Gray’s statement saying: “For Ofsted to give the best performing state school in the area its worst possible rating defies common sense. Removing a statement slamming the school’s Christian ethos from their final report tells us all we need to know about what is really behind the downgrading of the school.” His colleague Simon Calvert added: “The Government’s British values regime is twisting Ofsted’s priorities out of all proportion. Inspectors are asking all kinds of invasive questions and then issuing reports that the parents whose children attend the school don’t recognise.”
When the pagans control just about everything it's time to hear the advice of the great Abraham Kuyper: "our isolation is our strength". Christians in the UK need to forget government-controlled Free Schools. They will only ever be a front for secular humanism.
The only Free School is an independent, self-funded school. We, the believing Christian community, will have to bear its costs if we want our children to be taught the truth about the creation.
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