Book ReviewNew
perspectives in Catholic education
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Title: A Thomistic Approach to
Catholic Education
Author: Rev Fr Camillus Fernando
PhD
Page count: 118 Pages
Price: Rs 200
Author publication
Printed at Puji Graphics, Kelaniya
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Teaching is not simply a matter of teaching a set of high ideals or a
carefully considered personal ethical system but rather it is an
experience of love that has been divinized by being purified of
selfishness and lust.
The teacher is the key, the vital component if the educational goals
of any academic institution are to be achieved. The effectiveness of
teaching is closely tied to the training, the qualifications and the
personal ability of the teacher. Hence they should be men and women of
integrity and the leading light to illuminate the lives of those who
come under their feet for enlightenment.
These are views expressed and discussed in detail in the book A
Thomistic approach to Catholic Education` by Rev Fr Camillus Fernando,
BPh, BTh (Rome) Post Graduate, Dip in Buddhism, MSSc (Kelaniya) and PhD
(Rome). Fr Camillus, presently the Rector Holy Cross College, Kalutara,
was the former Dean of the Department of Philosophy, Lecturer of
Buddhist Philosophy, Epistemology, Political Science and Economics at
the National Seminary of Our Lady of Sri Lanka, Kandy.
The author has divided the book into two main parts and part one
deals with Catholic education, form of education, the efficient cause of
education, and philosophy of culture in education. The part two of the
book deals with understanding the ethnic diversity in a pluralistic
society. Under sub division of this section the author has taken pains
to explain what ethnicity is, what the ethnic problem in Sri Lanka is,
nation building process, integration principle and devolution of power.
Dealing with the qualities of teachers the author points out that
they should be capable of teaching, imparting knowledge lucidly and
clearly. They must set their life example for others who come under
their influence to follow and tread steps of their masters. They should
manifest their ability in such a way for the students to discern and
recognize authentic human qualities in the teachers under whose feet
they gather knowledge and get their characters mould.
Explaining who a teacher and what it means to teach the author says:
“A teacher is someone who spends a given amount of time going through
certain motions in a class room such as talking or writing on
blackboards and yet going through such motions is not how to teach. I
can talk my head off in a class room. And I can wear my fingers out
while writing on a blackboard. But it does not follow that I have
therefore taught anyone anything.”
The aim of education is to help children to actualize potentialities
they possess by birth and guide them towards their own human
achievements and hence education cannot escape the problems they face.
According to the views expressed by St Aquinas the teachers should
begin from where their students are and they should be very clear in
what they say, if they were to be successful. While stating teachers are
God chosen agents in transmitting of knowledge to others in accordance
with the views expressed by St Thomas Aquinas the author underscored the
fact that educations is a right of the Church.
“It is evident that both by right and in fact the mission to educate
belongs pre-eminently to the church.”
Teaching occurs only as learning takes place. It is a single activity
and it takes two for there to be teaching. People who are real teachers
must teach the truth, the author says quoting St Thomas Aquinas.
Based on the experience the author had gained over the years in
teaching profession he says that teachers could be successful in their
mission or vocation to the extent they display their human qualities of
affection, understanding, serenity of spirit, a balanced judgment,
patience to listen and most of all show prudence in the way they respond
and their readiness with open mind and heart to meet those who wish to
have a word with them.
A teacher who has a clear vision of teaching and who lives in accord
with it will be able to help students in developing a similar vision of
learning and assimilate and make what they learnt as part of their
lives. If the teacher is unprepared he could do greater harm than good,
the author has observed.
Explaining further the role of teacher he says that the teaching is
an art of facilitating others to engage in a voyage of poetic discovery
by showing them how to apply general self-evident principles to specific
issues and then to particular conclusions and then to others.
Teaching is making intelligible a subject to the other through the
use of language. It is an art especially a difficult one and the teacher
is an artiste.
Every art aims at some good. Education is an art and what good it
aims given the situation of the present world where there is conflict of
ideas with regard to all spheres of human life such as religion,
politics and social value.
St Thomas had summed up the definition of teaching thus. Therefore
just as the doctor is said to heal a patient through the activity of
nature, so a man is said to cause knowledge in another through the
activity of the learner’s own natural reason - and this is teaching.
The book could be a useful handbook and a tool to the teachers who
take their profession genuinely and seriously, having understood the
mindset of the children coming under their influence.
- Wiruma |
