[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—As this is
a time of plain speaking, will you allow me, as a constant reader of the Spectator, to make a brief and plain reply to the main contention of your earnest and vigorous article of last week ? It is not, emphatically not, to "Bible teaching" that Churchmen are objecting. What is indeed objected to is that so-called "Bible teaching" should be given by those whose knowledge of what they are attempting to teach is untested and uncertain, and whose whole attitude towards the Bible may be flippant, careless, cynical, or un- believing. And we decline to take the mere existence of a " syllabus " as any guarantee that "Bible teaching" will be either reverent or intelligent, or that it will not practically be pushed on one side in favour of other subjects of study which seem for the moment to be more urgent or to "pay" better. It is on such grounds as these, and not from any dislike or distrust of Bible teaching in itself, that Churchmen have now for years been viewing with increasing disfavour the style of religious instruction given in many Council schools. That they should willingly allow the Council school system to be forced upon their own schools is absolutely out of question ; and on the other hand, it seems only reasonable that they should ask
facilities for giving fuller and more certain instruction to Church children in the Council schools themselves, which they equally with Nonconformists are compelled to support.
—I am, Sir, &c., A. R. WHITHAM. Culham Training College, Abingdon.
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