Christian Environment
What does it mean to be a Christian School in the 21st Century?
Noted below are five models of Christian education. No claim is made that the list is exhaustive:
1. Some Christian schools appear to isolate themselves from popular culture and
protect their students from the excesses of consumer society. They focus on the teaching of the Bible and seek to enable students to grow up in the "knowledge and love of God". The majority of students in these schools come from Christian families. This model often is accompanied by a strong sense of Christian community. It can also be accompanied by a conservatism that represents Christian faith as on the defensive.
2. Some Christian schools seek to embrace inclusiveness as their central purpose and seek to build bridges within their community. One Church of England School in the Blackpool region in the UK is in a predominantly Islamic area, and is very popular with the local Islamic community. It has passages from the Bible and the Qur’an side by side as students enter the school. The majority of teachers are Christian or Secular. Such schools might, due to the need to make everyone feel included, struggle to debate Pilate’s question to Jesus "What is truth?", but they are forced to engage with the breadth of belief in their community. Their challenge is to not lose the distinctive call of the Christian gospel as they seek to be Christian in their sense of community.
3. Some Christian schools develop a dualism, with Christian faith being represented by a chaplaincy or a religious studies department. The rest of the school functions separately.
4. Some Christian schools represent faith socially and largely put aside theological discussion. They develop a strong sense of both mission and service in regard to the gospel. This view of knowledge does have a positive influence on the representation of knowledge throughout the school. A faith culture develops, but what is the role of individual faith?
5. Some Christian schools have a strong evangelistic edge to their sense of mission. Individual students come to faith and grow and mature. Others experience crises of faith. The emphasis on individual faith leads to personal faith. It can also support individualism per se.
At Inaburra we are seeking to build a model so that we become:
1. A school where the reading of the Old and New Testaments is enjoyed such
that students find reading about Jesus and those who came after and before Him deeply challenging and fulfilling. Like the Westminster Confession, we would hold that the chief purpose of people is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
2. A school where students, no matter their faith or lack of faith or sense of ‘unknowing’, feel valued.
3. A school where the religious nature of language is recognised, and Science and Religion are not seen as a dichotomy. The school has a responsibility to enable students to see how categories such as ‘religion’ and ‘science’ have been created. All Christian teachers have a personal and professional responsibility to engage with issues related to their subject area.
4. A School that takes James’ words about faith and works alongside those of Paul. We are saved by God’s grace, but created to serve others. We show our faith by our works. This is all part of the first two commands – to love God and to love your neighbour. Thus, we need a strong sense of mission – one that we engage with as a whole school and in which all students have a part to play.
5. A School that educates students about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, that enables students to understand themselves as created beings, not autonomous, but interdependent with each other and the natural world. We seek to be a school that is willing to ask students if they have considered the claims of Jesus. Each Easter we have "Mission Week". We work also to be a school that is able to teach all views well and is not afraid of debate or hard questions, a school that accepts knowledge as problematic and human perspectives as limited, yet accepts also the critical role of faith as a basis for knowledge.
Inaburra: Faith, Knowledge, Love