Archbishop Vincent Nichols on School Education

As a father of six and whose children attend Catholic schools, I find the words of Archbishop Nichols very encouraging indeed. At my recent school assmebly I spoke on the virtue of honesty in cultivating relationships since the children were looking at relationships in school. I think children learning the cultivation of a virtuous life in school is why I want Christian education for my children. We shall pray for our Christian faith schools to remain faithful to their ethos and help parents to build a virtuous generation to have the strength and courage to rebuild a virtuous society. Here is Archbishop Nichols' own words. Read it all here.

In his address he said that Catholic schools have a crucial role to play in cultivating virtues such as honesty, justice and compassion: Using the words of St Paul, he talked of the ‘supreme advantage of knowing Christ saying: “such a supreme advantage of knowing Christ, gives rise to a way of life which we believe fosters true virtue, true, steady life- building habits of mind and action. That’s what virtue is. It’s those habits of mind and action which genuinely serve the common good.; like honesty and justice and compassion and courage and prudence and temperance; that ability to moderate and use all things with good judgment.”

“There are plenty of indicators in our society today that we need such civic virtues in addition to regulation. Schools are the places where such virtue is generated or where it is neglected.” ‘A genuine service to society’ Archbishop Nichols went on to say that: “Today we live in a society that tends to instrumentalise everything. In other words, everything is broken down to clear objectives and attainments and each is given a price. Once this really takes hold then education has truly entered the market place. We are finding ourselves considered as nothing more than consumers and suppliers.”