School as Sanctuary

After school murders, this time at a college, the Governor’s point person said that, Our schools are a sanctuary and they should be safe. I agree. The Governor’s solution is gun control, but government can not speak to the real problem, such as, self-control, since so much of current culture is out of control.

When we contemplate the idea that all schools should be a “sanctuary” and safe, I don’t think that many schools are safe in any class. I will not write here about leftist ideologies in the curricula, but the old-fashioned problem of peer pressure. Sanctuary’s root word is the Latin, “sanctus”, At one time a major problem in a school was chewing gum, now it’s birth control. Another problem was not getting in line, now it’s getting high. There were always bullies in a school, but now it’s a twitter mob and social network bullies…by the thousands. One time a concern was piercing one’s ears, now it’s cutting off body parts…I could go on. There is little that is holy at all in our schools. Peers’ are educated by their peers is the bitter fruit of the ’60s’ revolutions: the blind leading the blind”. Lutheran pastor and professor, Dr. Kurt Marquardt, in the context of the Church pointedly about lack of self-control in children teaching their elders in 1978:

Who, after all, could respect an institution (church) which is, after two thousand years’ experience, so confused about its functions as to say, in effect: “Dear children, help us! We are no longer sure about what we ought to be doing. Perhaps you might have some good ideas?” Who could possibly take seriously the play-worship prefixed with that horrid word, “experimental”? The fact is that no healthy, viable society lets its children arbitrate its values. It is for the elders of the tribe to guard its cultural heritage and to transmit it solemnly to the younger generation-never vice versa. Also in our society the problem is not with the youth but with their elders. 

Our children should be taught by adults…faithful and grown-up. The Lord wants us feed the sheep, not experiment with rats. And if there is nothing of “sanctus” in a school, then it is not safe. Parents are removing their children from the public schools for an education with teachers who teach the truth in love. We need schools where the Lord is confessed…not the culture. This is good.