We started off by tackling the question, “Would it be beneficial for Catholic schools to have optional religion classes?” We all agreed the answer is no because religion courses are fundamental to a child’s development of Catholic values and virtues. This prompted another question: “With today’s society and complex economic situations forcing both parents to work in most cases, who will teach the students about these Catholic values and virtues if not the schools?”
Catholic schools play a fundamental role in building up a student’s Catholic faith. School can lead them to understand morality and how it deeply impacts their lives. Catholic schools help students work out the consequences of the decisions they make now and the ones that they may make later on in life.
Catholic schools help students live, practise and highlight the vows that their parents made on their behalf during baptism and the vows that they themselves make during confirmation. Schools help students uphold these promises.
And by teaching mandatory religion classes, Catholic schools help students study and witness together as a community. They play a crucial role in the basic student lifestyle.
One of my religion teachers told me that religion class instils the values and virtues of Catholicism upon students and that it is in religion class where students can talk about issues affecting their lives in a secure and comfortable environment, learning how to deal with these issues in a way that upholds all of the values of the Catholic faith.
Furthermore, since we live in a materialistic society, people are attached to objects. Religion class teaches us over and over again how we should avoid attachment to objects, that we should value people more. Without religion class, would we learn this as quickly? Would we continue to take the people in our lives for granted, always opting for the material objects we possess instead of their love and time? As students, being mature enough to realize how much we truly need other people in our lives is a sign of growing maturity.
Not every religion has the opportunity to be taught daily at school and enhance the lives of young believers. So instead of asking if religion is more beneficial as an optional course, we should first ask ourselves why we would want to avoid a course which is so essential to our growth as people who uphold Catholic values? Religion classes are giving students the chance to understand their Catholic roots at a young age. For this fact alone it should remain a mandatory course. For if it was optional, it is a certainty that fewer students, without the foresight to see the value of religion class, would choose to learn about their faith in a way that only the schools can teach.
(Swist, 16, is a student at Loretto Abbey Catholic Secondary School in Toronto.)