Westminster Classical Journal — Spring 2024

THE JOURNAL Westminster Classical

e Gi of Literature

TINA BERGS

A Mismatch in Music

ROGER BERGS

Discipline and the Compassionate Teacher

ELISHA GALOTTI

“For the Bene t of Future Readers”: Eusebius and the Writing of Church History

DAVID ROBINSON

e Loss of Virtue in Modern Education

BRENDEN BOTT

Why Publish a Journal on Classical Christian Education in Canada?

The Reformers knew how essential Christian education is for children. They also knew the importance of turning to the authority of Scripture and the wisdom of the past (ad fontes) to secure the truths necessary for a child’s heart and mind to flourish.

The battle over the future of our families, our churches, and even our country will be won or lost in the education of our children. I am certain of this. And if we are to educate our children properly in these times, we need resources to encourage and unify us, texts we can share and use in our homes, churches, and schools. This journal is an attempt to be one of those resources.

I hope you find encouragement in its pages and are inspired to join us in advancing classical Christian education in Canada.

Soli Deo gloria, Brenden Bott HEAD OF SCHOOL WESTMINSTER CLASSICAL CHRISTIAN ACADEMY

The Gift of Literature

Written by Tina Bergs

I vividly recall the first time I read an entire novel. I was eight years old, and I had just begun volunteering in the school library. Our librarian was an admirable, elegant lady, and she recommended a particular book to me. I signed it out—the process where you wrote your name on the card inside the flap, and then your book was stamped with the due date—and I eagerly took it home, promptly reading it from cover to cover. As soon as I finished it, I was hooked. Now I knew that I could live in the world of imagination whenever I desired. I just had to take another book out of the library.

What was so transformative about that first reading experience? I recall that the book was about a girl who thought she was human, but she was actually a fairy. She was instructed to perform a secret test that would reveal her true nature: the elbow kiss. She was surprised that she could, in fact, kiss her elbow! (Yes, I’ll admit that as I was reading the book, I attempted to kiss my elbow more than a few times. Sadly, to no avail.) Reading that book was like living in a dream world where anything was possible—even the exciting prospect that I might actually be a real fairy.

In order to truly understand a work of fiction and receive the fullness of its message, readers must temporarily suspend their disbelief and allow their imaginations to carry them into the world of the story. Inspired by Northrop Frye’s book The Educated Imagination, 1 Victor Shepherd argues that people do not grasp reality through direct statements, propositions, and principles; reality is not known until we “step into” it:

Fiction … communicates indirectly by inviting us into a reality that we live by means of imagination … Literature creates a world, and the writer invites your participation: you will not understand what the novel is about unless you step into that created world and live in it.2

Similarly, when Jesus taught using parables, he was communicating truth in a way his hearers could grasp only after entering into the story, and only then could they receive the truth contained therein.

As C. S. Lewis wrote, “There is nothing in literature which does not, in some degree, percolate into life.”3 Much of what children read will impress itself upon their minds, shape their attitudes, and eventually show up in their actions. The literature they read early on will help pour the concrete of their life’s moral foundation, and brick by brick these stories will build the walls of their thought lives and character. To the degree that these stories reflect God’s moral law, they will help to finely tune children’s consciences to the

1. Northrop Frye, The Educated Imagination (Toronto: CBC Publications, 1963).

2. Victor A. Shepherd, The Committed Self: An Introduction to Existentialism for Christians (Toronto: BPS Books, 2015), 15.

3. C. S. Lewis, The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936), 130.

difference between right and wrong, good and evil, beauty and ugliness, selflessness and selfishness.

Children will begin to recognize the moral choices they must make, and (mostly subconsciously) they will apply the moral standards they have internalized through reading these stories. In any given moral dilemma they face, they must choose to do what is right and avoid what is wrong. When they choose wisely, they will mature and grow in wisdom. When they fail to consistently live up to the highest standards they know, they will be confronted with their need for a saviour. The law is the schoolmaster that leads us to Christ, and the word of God does not return void.

Just as we do not indiscriminately take our children on visits to any place without knowing whether that place is wholesome, we similarly should prevent them from visiting unwholesome places in the world of literature. A few years ago, Andrew Pudewa (founder and director of the Institute for Excellence in Writing) gave our faculty at Westminster Classical Christian Academy categories to use when evaluating the moral content of the stories that we might share with our students:

• If the story portrays as good what the Bible says is good, if it portrays as bad what the Bible says is bad, and if good triumphs over evil, or if there is a redemptive element, then the story is whole or healing. The story aligns well with the Bible, and its message can be received by Christians with joy.

• If bad triumphs over good in the story, then the story is broken. It should be read cautiously, not by young children, and only by older children with guidance from a discerning adult.

The classical teacher curates a selection of stories that are nourishing and tasteful, that stir the heart, that inspire wonder, courage, honesty, kindness, and selflessness.

• If the story elevates or glorifies what the Bible says is evil and derides what the Bible says is good (even subtly), then that story is twisted. It is dangerous because it is fundamentally disordering to the imagination and can cause the reader to like what is evil.

Both teachers and parents would do well to keep these categories in mind as we consider the books we make available to our students and children.

In addition to considering the moral content of literature, classical educators steer their students towards literature that nourishes the imagination. A story that seems innocuous may still be a waste of time, just as food that is “empty calories” (lacking in both nourishment and taste) is hardly worth eating. Charlotte Mason, the 19th century British educator, called these empty books “twaddle”:

[Children] must grow up upon the best. There must never be a period in their lives when they are allowed to read or listen to twaddle or reading-made-easy. There is never a time when they are unequal to worthy thoughts, well put; inspiring tales, well told.4

4. Charlotte Mason, Parents and Children, AmblesideOnline’s Annotated Charlotte Mason Series, 263, https://www.amblesideonline.org/CM/ vol2complete.html#263.

Just as we strive to give our children high-quality and good-tasting food for their bodies, we should likewise be determined to feed their minds with praiseworthy fiction because literature shapes their tastes. (You are what you eat, and books are no exception.)

In classical Christian education, books proven over time to stimulate the imagination and intellect are given priority in the curriculum. The teacher curates a selection of stories that are nourishing and tasteful, that stir the heart, that inspire wonder, courage, honesty, kindness, and selflessness. The goal is to expose students to the highest moral beauty they can imagine in order to prepare them to meet and welcome the perfect moral glory incarnated in the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom they will recognize all their heart’s longings and all that they lack.

The gift of literature that my librarian gave me at eight years old was the gift of knowing that I could, at practically any time, travel to another world where my imagination would meet with the author’s imagination, and we would share the delicious prospect that beyond what could be seen, there was another realm. Marvellous possibilities existed in that realm that did not immediately appear to exist in my surrounding circumstances. By giving children the gift of good literature, we are nurturing their moral imaginations in order to prepare them for God’s glorious revelation: “For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed” (Romans 8:19 NIV).

About the Author

Tina Bergs

Tina Bergs teaches Grades 5 and 6 and serves as the Assistant Head of School at Westminster Classical Christian Academy (WCCA). She completed a Bachelor of Education at the University of Victoria and a post-degree diploma in Special Education Teaching at Vancouver Island University. Tina worked as both a classroom teacher and a special education teacher in public schools in British Columbia before becoming one of the first teachers to join the WCCA faculty when the school opened its doors in 2014.

A Mismatch in Music

Written by Roger Bergs

A large fraction of my life as a professional musician involves teaching at the postsecondary level. I teach courses that examine the logic of harmony and form: how notes come together to form chords, how chords interact to build phrases of music, and how phrases combine to make up larger musical structures. I teach courses in counterpoint, which is the study of the intricate interplay of single lines of music. I also teach individual lessons in music composition, which is the most individually expressive aspect of musical creation.

But one class that I teach—Introduction to Music—is qualitatively different from all the rest. In it, we cover the most basic aspects of notated music: note values, major and minor keys, intervals and their proper labelling, rests and beamed notes and their groupings, time signatures and their implications, and on from there.

Although I work hard to make the subject matter engaging, many students in this class face a degree of frustration that is absent from their other courses. The classical education paradigm is helpful in explaining both why the course is necessary (as the basis for more advanced musical study) and why it is uniquely frustrating for first-year university students.

The classical paradigm wisely divides a child’s learning into three stages, which we label as Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric. The genius of the classical model is that the stages of a child’s natural development map convincingly onto these three stages of learning. When children are in the Grammar stage (up until about Grade 4), they are sponges for information and easily absorb facts, such as rules for spelling or elements of the construction of a narrative. When they are in the Logic stage (from about Grade 5 to Grade 8), they begin to think more abstractly, such as questioning the motivation of characters in a story and grasping the rules of formal logic. When they arrive at the Rhetoric stage in their high school years, their natural desire for self-expression can soar because their grasp of basic information (grammar) and the interplay of ideas (logic) gives them the tools they need for forming and communicating their original thinking.

While this model applies to language arts (with its rules of grammar and logic a necessary prerequisite to any creative application) and to other linguistically driven subjects (e.g., history, philosophy, and Bible), it is also true that every discipline has its three stages. Grammar is not just the rules of English but the basic information that must be present in order to dive deeply into any subject. Logic is how the pieces fit together. Rhetoric is making an original contribution to the field—but one that presupposes the prior knowledge of the relevant grammar and logic.

The process of developing a deep understanding of music depends on a similar tripartite pattern of knowledge. The grammar of music means grasping such basic details as keys and scales, rhythms and time signatures, notes and rests, and so on. The logic of music means understanding not merely how chords are formed by combining multiple notes but how those chords behave in a particular musical context. (For example, a cadence is a special progression of two chords that signals the end of a phrase. The chords used are quite limited and follow severely prescribed patterns across a wide variety of musical styles.) Rhetoric in music—which is any form of capable and convincing self-expression within the art—depends on a flawless grasp of musical grammar and personal insight into its logic.

So, the classical tripartite model is as relevant to education in music as it is to education in language. Unfortunately, it is rare that any child studying music has mastered its grammar by Grade 4. Thus, a common source of frustration among those studying music lies in the fact that they are stuck memorizing musical basics at a stage in life when their natural predisposition would prefer to be engaged in studies of logic and rhetoric.

The students in my Introduction to Music course are generally about eighteen years old. Yet the content of the course requires them to memorize facts and rules that children up to the age of about nine learn easily. In the vast majority of their other courses, they can dive into the logic of the discipline almost immediately and often engage productively in rhetorical applications soon thereafter. But in Introduction to Music, they have to endure a course in basic musical grammar.1

Bringing the content of musical education into line with our children’s developmental stage would require devoting enormously greater amounts of time and discipline to musical education than we currently do. I do not necessarily advocate for such an increase but recognize that parents who value musical education often send their children for private musical instruction outside of school hours.2

The genius of the classical model is that the stages of a child’s natural development map convincingly onto these three stages of learning.

Still, it makes sense for classical Christian music educators to teach the basic grammar of the field with enthusiasm (and without embarrassment), rather than skipping over essentials to jump to an under-resourced “self-expression” lacking in the fundamentals of grammar and logic. We must acknowledge the mismatch of content and developmental stage and do our best to keep instruction in grammar interesting, even if it comes in later grades.

I conclude by acknowledging that every specialist is fond of advocating for the greater importance of his or her own specialty. Guilty as charged. But Christians would do well to remember the prominent

1. This mismatch of developmental stage and the content of musical education is present even in Canada’s venerable Royal Conservatory of Music curriculum. The RCM has been providing commonly accepted benchmarks in musical education for well over a hundred years. The written components of their graded system are still teaching Grammar (they even call it Rudiments!) up to Grade 8. (A serious music student would typically be working on Grade 8 material in their early teens.)

2. Intriguingly, the system of elementary musical education in Hungary often does give music a level of emphasis that strives to match the content of musical education with its appropriate stage in childhood development. The tradition of high standards in Hungarian musical education have been exceptional among European nations for a century or more.

place given to music throughout Biblical worship. In an age when so much of our music lacks the logic of the music that has survived since past ages (and when so many prominent popular musicians lack even basic musical grammar), the need for a distinctively classical Christian approach to musical education that serves the Church has never been greater.

About the Author

Roger Bergs

Roger Bergs is a composer, conductor, and organist. He has a Doctor of Music degree in Composition from the University of Toronto and a Master of Music degree in Composition from The Julliard School. His compositions have been commissioned, performed, and recorded by ensembles including the Symphony Orchestras of Toronto, Winnipeg, and Edmonton. He teaches courses in music theory and design of worship at Redeemer University and courses in composition and music theory at the University of Toronto.

Discipline and the Compassionate Teacher

Written by Elisha Galotti

“I’m not walking anymore!” My five-year-old student’s brown eyes looked up at me as he said this, feet planted on the sidewalk. The line of a dozen paired-up students came to a stop behind us. It was a warm September afternoon, and our kindergarten class was halfway back from the playground situated fifteen minutes from our school.

“Sweetheart, we’re not stopping here. We’re almost back to school, and your job right now is to continue walking without complaining.” His brow furrowed, and then, pulling his hand from my own, he sank down into a low squat with his seat just inches off the ground.

In the passing moment before addressing him, I glanced at the line of students watching us, aware that a resolution had to be quick and my authority had to be certain. It was not the first moment of struggle today for this boy, and I felt my frustration well up. I wished he could just let school life be easier. I was prepared to remind him of the expectations, along with the consequences if he refused.

I knelt beside him and, with my hands, gently lifted his face until his eyes met my own. In that moment, my frustration melted. “Are you tired, little one?” He nodded. “You know, I’m tired too. I think we could both use some encouragement. I have an idea. You must continue walking, and you must speak respectfully even when you’re tired; but while we’re walking, if I’m feeling tired, I’ll give your hand a squeeze to let you know. You can say four little words back: You can do it.” I said each of the four words distinctly, lifting a finger one at a time to represent each word. “To make it fun, instead of saying the words, you can squeeze my hand back four times, and I’ll know it’s a secret code: You. Can. Do. It. Four words, four squeezes. And if you feel tired, you let me know, and I’ll encourage you through secret code too.” He smiled and stood, took my hand, and was eager to be off.

The remainder of our walk back to school was not only free of complaining but it cultivated a warmth and affection between us. I had nurtured this boy’s trust that I would help him when he struggled and taught him the principle of encouraging another even when you are discouraged. With all the whispering-while-counting-hand-squeezing going on, the walk back was also just plain fun. Simply put, his defiance gave way to cheerful, quick obedience.

Since that afternoon on the sidewalk, my mind has often returned to that moment. My student needed to hear my voice and follow my instructions. There is no doubt that for the good of that class and the good of that boy’s heart, my authority needed to be clear and the fruit of obedience needed to be

quick. But within the pale of right leadership, there is often a range of possibilities for how a teacher may use his or her authority.

In the initial moment, frustration took hold. I was simply going to declare what he was doing wrong and remind him of the consequences if he refused to obey. This approach would not have been wrong, and likely would have even brought about obedience. However, I know the deficiencies of my own heart, and I know my first instinct, driven by frustration, was lacking in a foundational virtue: compassion.

How many times do I follow the correct formula for training in discipline but fail to demonstrate the virtue of compassion?

Before considering the heart of the teacher, we must first affirm that there is no freedom without discipline and, in the Grammar years especially, regular training in the habit of obedience is necessary. Calm, well-ordered classrooms create readiness for engaged learning and joyful play. It is the teacher’s daily task to train students to listen, follow instructions, and submit to the teacher’s authority. The fruit of obedience leads to abundant life, and we accept this God-given authority to lead when we step into the role of a teacher.

The fruit of obedience leads to abundant life, and we accept this God-given authority to lead when we step into the role of a teacher.

However, once the necessity of discipline and the dangers of permissiveness are properly acknowledged, there are questions we should ask ourselves as we strive to become the teachers we ought to be: Am I a compassionate teacher? Does my discipline flow from a frustrated heart or a compassionate one? Do I see my students as whole, complex persons who will invariably struggle? Do I remember that training children in right behaviour is what I signed up for when I became a teacher? If my students were to narrate a day in my classroom, would they tell the story of a teacher who is frustrated with them or of one who delights in them? Do I sympathize with my students in their weakness? Do I lead my students the way my Teacher leads me?

In classical education, we often reflect on mimetic teaching and how, when it is implemented wisely, the student is not merely to imitate a lesson or a behaviour. Rather, on the deepest level, mimetic teaching is meant to cultivate virtue—an attitude of the heart.

We who teach are still being taught, and our Teacher, when we are weary, defiant, or unwilling to keep going, is One who has compassion for us. The struggle to do what is right may look different for adults than for children, but we have a Teacher who is gentle, who hears our cry, who stoops low and helps us. When He lifts our face and our eyes meet His, we see a Teacher who is neither harsh nor frustrated with us. Far from this, we see the heart of a Teacher who humbled Himself and sympathizes with us in our weakness.

Being a teacher is a holy calling. Sometimes we forget what a sacred task we have been given as we teach a little person made in God’s very image. Students are humans, and in a sinful, broken world, humans will inevitably struggle to do what is right at times. In these moments of struggle, may we discipline with a heart of compassion.

About the Author

Elisha Galotti

Elisha Galotti teaches Junior Kindergarten at Westminster Classical Christian Academy. Elisha received her Bachelor of Arts from Ryerson University and then continued her education with the Royal Academy of Dance, completing an intensive three-year Teaching Certificate Program. She started teaching at WCCA in 2015.

“For the Benefit of Future Readers”:

Eusebius and the Writing of Church History

Written by David Robinson

The Psalmist exhorts the worshipper in Psalm 105: “Seek the L ord and his strength; seek his presence continually! Remember the wondrous works that he has done” (vv. 4–5a ESV). The living God speaks and acts in history. We seek him, his strength, and his presence by remembering the past. The Church’s worship and witness are vitally connected to the Church’s memory. History matters.

Holy Scripture remembers and recounts “the wondrous works he has done” (Ps. 105:5). Luke, the Evangelist, writes in the preface to his second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, “In my first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach” (Acts 1:1). The Gospels are the beginning of a new chapter in history, in which Jesus continues to speak and act through his Church. That history did not end in Acts 28.

Eusebius of Caesarea (ca. 260–339) was the first Christian to write a history of the Church after the Acts of the Apostles. He testifies in the opening pages of his Ecclesiastical History, “I am the first to venture on such a project and to set out on what is indeed a lonely and untrodden path” (Hist. eccl. 1.1).1 He may have been the first to venture this path, but he did not walk in the dark. He lived in Caesarea Maritima, an imperial city on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, where Origen of Alexandria had established a Christian academy and library. Eusebius had the resources he needed to write a history of the Church. He offers this poetic description of his sources and his project:

Raising their voices like warning lights far ahead and calling out as from a distant watchtower perched on some hill, they make clear to me by what path I must walk and guide the course of my book if I am to reach my goal in safety. Thus from the scattered hints dropped by my predecessors I have picked out whatever seems relevant to the task I have undertaken, plucking like flowers in literary pastures the helpful contributions of earlier writers, to be embodied in the continuous narrative I have in mind. If I can save from oblivion the successors, not perhaps of all our Saviour’s apostles but at least of the most distinguished, in the most famous and still pre-eminent churches, I shall be content. It is, I think, most necessary that I should devote myself to this project, for as far as I am aware no previous Church historian has been interested in the records of this kind; records which those who are eager to learn the lessons of history will, I am confident, find most valuable. (Hist. eccl. 1.1)2

1. Eusebius, The History of the Church, trans. G. A. Williamson, rev. and ed. Andrew Louth (New York: Penguin Books, 1989), 2.

2. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 2.

With these introductory remarks, Eusebius announces his practice and purpose in writing history. He has selected, gathered, and arranged his sources into a narrative so that the past will be remembered and teach future readers.

Eusebius compares his work as a historian to the work of a florist, plucking flowers from literary pastures and arranging a narrative bouquet. This is what historians do. They select and sift their sources, and they organize and present them in a continuous narrative.

Eusebius cites written sources throughout his narrative. In places, his work reads like an anthology of various texts3 because he wants to let the past speak for itself and he wants to preserve the testimony of the past for future generations. Thus, concerning Polycarp, he writes, “As a written account of his end has come down to us, I am in duty bound to enshrine it in my pages” (Hist. eccl. 4.14).4 Again, he introduces a lengthy quotation of a letter signed by various bishops: “To make sure that the facts are not forgotten, it would be well at this point to reproduce what they said” (Hist. eccl. 7.30).5

The testimony of the past bears witness to Christ. After citing various written records of the martyrs, he writes, “In these trials the splendid martyrs of Christ let their light so shine over the whole world that they everywhere astounded the eyewitnesses of their courage—and small wonder: they furnished in themselves unmistakable proof of our Saviour’s truly divine and ineffable power” (Hist. eccl. 8.12).6 Eusebius himself witnessed martyrdoms, and his own experience corroborated the testimony of these written records: “When these things were going on I was there myself, and there I witnessed the ever-present divine power of Him to whom they testified, our Saviour Jesus Christ Himself, visibly manifesting itself to the martyrs” (Hist. eccl. 8.7).7

The Gospels are the beginning of a new chapter in history, in which Jesus continues to speak and act through his Church. That history did not end in Acts 28.

Eusebius has written this history so that the testimony of the past might shine for future generations. The light of that testimony reveals Christ, to whom the entire narrative of his history points. Like all historians, he determines a beginning and an end to his narrative. He begins with Christ: “Any man who intends to commit to writing the record of the Church’s history is bound to go right back to Christ Himself, whose name we are privileged to share” ( Hist. eccl. 1.1). 8 And he ends with Christ, who delivered the Church from persecution during the reign of Constantine: “At the end of it all the kind and gracious deliverance accorded by our Saviour”

3. Given his metaphor of picking and arranging flowers, we should not be surprised that his history resembles a florilegium in some parts.

4. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 117.

5. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 246.

6. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 271.

7. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 263.

8. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 2.

( Hist. eccl. 1.1). 9 Christ’s presence and providence frames the narrative and directs the plot of the Church’s history.

Eusebius highlights God’s providence in preserving and promoting the gospel message. He writes concerning the emperor Tiberius’ tolerance of Christians, “Heavenly providence had purposefully put this in the emperor’s mind, in order that the gospel message should get off to a good start and speed to every part of the world” (Hist. eccl. 2.2).10 Concerning the ministry of those who succeeded the apostles, he writes, “These earnest disciples of great men built on the foundations of the churches everywhere laid by the apostles, spreading the message still further and sowing the saving seed of the Kingdom of Heaven far and wide through the entire world” (Hist. eccl. 3.37).11 For Eusebius, as for Luke in the Acts of the Apostles, the history of the Church is a history of the spread of the gospel message.12

Luke wrote a narrative and orderly account of the life and ministry of Jesus and the apostles for Theophilus so that he would “have certainty concerning the things [he has] been taught” (Luke 1:4). History confirms catechesis. Eusebius wrote “for the benefit of future readers” (Hist. eccl. 3.23),13 so they would know that their baptismal catechism and confession preserved the gospel message, preached and handed down from the apostles, and that the same God and Saviour they confessed in baptism was present and active in history.

Eusebius wrote church history for the benefit of future readers, including us. Although he was the first to venture on such a project, many historians have followed him since, bearing witness to God’s presence and providence in history. We do well to engage their work and continue the project. For we do not write and teach and learn history to satisfy antiquarian curiosity. We write and teach and learn history because we worship and bear witness to the living God by remembering and recounting his wondrous deeds.

About the Author

David Robinson

David Robinson is the senior pastor at Westminster Chapel at High Park. He has a Ph.D. in Theology from the University of St. Michael’s College (at the University of Toronto), where he studied the history and theology of Early Christianity. David also teaches courses in Biblical studies and systematic and historical theology at Tyndale University.

9. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 1.

10. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 39.

11. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 100.

12. Cf. Acts 6:7; 12:24; 19:20; 28:30–31.

13. Eusebius, The History of the Church, 85 (cf. Hist. eccl. 1.1, 7.26, 8.1).

The Loss of Virtue in Modern Education

Written by Brenden Bott

Our culture has shifted. Many of the things we once knew to be essential for education have been lost and forgotten; the indispensable has been dispensed with. Now our children live with the consequences. Because so many foundational elements are missing from modern education and the accompanying effects are innumerable, we will have to limit our focus here to one subject of concern: virtue.

Given how quickly our cultural memory has faded, it can be difficult for many to see the connection between the removal of virtue from our schools and our current social challenges. Perhaps it is best to begin with a story.

Francesca Gino is an unusually talented person with an unusually successful career. She is what our society would call accomplished. Dr. Gino is not only an expert in behavioural science, award-winning researcher, and best-selling author but she also occupies one of the most desirable positions in academia: she is a professor at Harvard University.

Despite Dr. Gino’s sterling academic accomplishments, which should involve rigorous assessment of evidence and uncompromising adherence to the truth, she has been accused of fabricating a considerable amount of her research.1 As a result of these allegations, Harvard has placed her on unpaid leave.

When we hear a story like this, it is easy to blame Dr. Gino. Why would she risk so much at the height of her career? But questions like this make the mistake of treating her as an isolated case and suggest that if the mounting evidence against her is accurate, Dr. Gino is an incomprehensible figure in an otherwise undisturbed sea of cultural moral integrity. Sadly, she is far from an anomaly; rather, she is only a particularly visible example of a culture and educational establishment that has lost its way.

If the accusations against Dr. Gino are true, and she has been relying upon dishonesty to embellish her work at one of the world’s top purveyors of knowledge, then she is a symptom of our culture’s widespread corruption of attitudes toward traditional virtues like honesty. This corruption is hardly unexpected, especially considering that we have intentionally removed God’s moral law from our education system and replaced it with a worldview that is devoid of ultimate value or meaning, one that considers the miracles of life around us as merely accidental by-products of an unguided process preoccupied with survival. But whatever reasons people may give to account for this decline in cul-

1. Noam Scheiber, “Harvard Scholar Who Studies Honesty Is Accused of Fabricating Findings,” New York Times, last modified June 2023, https:// www.nytimes.com/2023/06/24/business/economy/francesca-gino-harvard-dishonesty.html.

tural values, it is here. As William Damon, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, notes, “Teaching honesty is no longer a priority in our schools.”2 And as go priorities, so goes the world.

It only takes a brief survey of the literature to discover that academic dishonesty is as common as the colour green. And this pervasive disregard for honesty is something our culture can credit as one of its more recent achievements. As Twenge and Campbell write, “Cheating is … rampant, and growing, among students. In 2002, 74% of high school students admitted to cheating, up from 61% in 1992. In 1969, only 34% of high school students admitted to cheating.”3

Even the formidable world of academic journals is not immune, as significant amounts of unreliable material have been found to be published in supposedly rigorous publications. In a 2015 study on the credibility of psychological studies, we get a picture of this reality. This analysis, which attempted to replicate the results of one hundred studies from top-notch journals, draws the following conclusion:

Experiments that seek to demonstrate a cause/effect relation most often manipulate the postulated causal factor. … Assessing whether the replication and the original experiment yielded the same result according to several criteria, they found that about one-third to onehalf of the original findings were also observed in the replication study.4

In other words, only 33% to 50% of the findings in the studies examined were found to be reliable.

The reasons for these concerning revelations may be various, but they suggest that much more of the research we value may be tainted by intentional mishandling than we are normally led to believe. It is especially concerning that even in the rigorously scientific field of medical science, significant amounts of fraud are found. The Economist, in its research into the credibility of medical publications, writes, “Partly or entirely fabricated papers are being found in ever-larger numbers.”5 The article also notes that “in a survey of academics in Britain, published in 2016, nearly one in five reported having fabricated data.”6 In the world of higher education, as in the culture around us, integrity is starting to crumble.

I t is no surprise that in 2023, only 36% of respondents in a Gallup poll had strong confidence in higher education, a percentage that shows a steep decline from 57% in 2015. 7 As ChatGPT, a

2. William Damon, “The Death of Honesty: The Failure to Cultivate Virtue in Citizens Can be a Lethal Threat to Any Democracy,” Hoover Institution, last modified January 2012, https://www.hoover.org/research/death-honesty.

3. Even more alarming, a “large 2008 survey of teens found that two-thirds admitted to cheating and nearly one-third had stolen something from a store. Nevertheless, 93% said they were satisfied with their personal ethics.” Jean M. Twenge and W. Keith Campbell, The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age Of Entitlement (New York: Atria Paperback, 2009), 206.

4. “Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science,” Science, last modified August 2015, https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science. aac4716.

5. For an analysis of this phenomena, see “There Is a Worrying Amount of Fraud in Medical Research: And a Worrying Unwillingness to Do Anything about It,” The Economist, last modified February 2023, https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2023/02/22/there-is-a-worrying-amount-offraud-in-medical-research#:~:text=And%20in%20a%20recent%20survey,already%20backed%20by%20other%20work.

6. “Worrying Amount of Fraud.”

7. Megan Brenan, “Americans’ Confidence in Higher Education Down Sharply,” Gallup, last modified July 2023, https://news.gallup.com/ poll/508352/americans-confidence-higher-education-down-sharply.aspx.

new form of technology that makes dishonesty so much less detectable than before, creeps into our institutions, it is difficult to foresee much resistance against further moral decline.

It is unreasonable to view the current state of things as anything less than catastrophic. The Economist , in a heartbreaking example of what happens when honesty is abandoned, writes, “For more than a decade, cardiac patients in Europe were given beta-blockers before surgery, with the intention of reducing heart attacks and strokes—a practice that rested on a study from 2009 which was eventually determined to have been based, at least in part, on fabricated data. By one estimate, this approach may have caused 10,000 deaths a year in Britain alone.” 8 But it is not just unnecessary deaths. There are a thousand other things, some of them inexplicable, that we lose when honesty is absent, including the basic trust we have for one another, something any culture needs to thrive.

Without virtue, what

do we have?

Even if

we know what is good, if we do not have the courage to act upon it, what kind of world can we hope for?

Without virtue, what do we have? Even if we know what is good, if we do not have the courage to act upon it, what kind of world can we hope for? What kind of culture will we create? What kind of people will we be? In a passage often misattributed to C. S. Lewis, Arthur Wellesley warns about education without God: “Take care what you are about, for unless you base all this on religion, you are only making so many clever devils.” 9 If a person makes it to the top of his or her field in our culture, it does not necessarily follow that this person is of good character, someone equipped to handle truth, goodness, and beauty and to cultivate these things in our world.

It is unlikely that when she was a little girl Francesca Gino had the ambition to manipulate academic studies. It is also unlikely that those involved in fabricating medical studies intended to use their education to put people’s lives at risk. But when virtue is not cultivated in education, there are no limits to the damage. As responsibilities grow in life, our character needs to grow in the measure needed to handle them.

About the Author Brenden Bott

Brenden Bott is the Head of School at Westminster Classical Christian Academy. He has a doctorate in theology from the University of Toronto, Wycliffe College, specializing in medieval and Reformation thought and theodicy.

8. See “Worrying Amount of Fraud,” The Economist.

9. Arthur Wellesley, quoted in Philip Henry, Notes of Conversations with the Duke of Wellington, 1831-1851 (New York: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1888), 261.

Letters from our WCCA Bursary Recipients

We are so grateful to be able to send our children to Westminster Classical Christian Academy. The teachers have always gone above their job description with individual attention and an obvious sincere desire to guide the children in their care. Sending our children to a school where teachers pray for them daily is also invaluable.

My husband teaches in the public school system and sees firsthand its academic, social, and moral decline. Because of this, we have decided that we will do everything we can to keep our children in a classical Christian school. Any talk of moving away from the city always revolves around where we could find another classical Christian school.

I am a freelance musician, and without a bursary, a private Christian education would be out of reach for our family. Thank you for considering donating to WCCA! It is a very special family and a much-needed light in the city.

- Lydia Munchinsky

I have always championed the cause of private Christian education, appreciating its emphasis on discipline, academic rigor, and a structured environment. Before relocating to Canada, I resided in a country where access to such education was more readily available, and my child had initially commenced his schooling in similar institutions.

Upon our arrival in Canada, adapting to the educational system proved to be a challenge for both of us. I fervently prayed for a miracle, desiring to continue my child’s education in an environment akin to what we were accustomed to. However, financial constraints made this aspiration seem nearly impossible.

In a world saturated with confusing ideologies, I am thankful for Westminster Classical Christian Academy, a school that aligns with my Christian and personal values in both its curriculum and environment. The assistance provided through the bursary made it possible for my child to attend such a school. Witnessing my child’s flourishing love for Christ on a daily basis fills me with immense gratitude to God for the financial relief provided.

-

Our family has been in missions ministry in Toronto for over 15 years. When we sent our first child to JK at Westminster Classical Christian Academy a few years ago, we had every intention to change her enrolment to a French school the following year. We wanted our children to have a strong proficiency in multiple languages. What we did not anticipate, though, were the ways that gospel nuggets began to seep into the daily rhythms as our daughter returned home from school.

Beyond simply singing hymns and reciting Bible verses, we were delighted that our daughter began asking deeper questions about how God’s kingdom, order, and mission intersected with the everyday ordinary. We had such a positive experience that we ultimately decided to keep our daughter (and subsequently her siblings) enrolled at WCCA. More than the language of French, we wanted our children to be familiar with the language of God.

We continue to commend the school and invite you to consider beginning, if not continuing, to support WCCA through financial giving. As we continue to send all three of our children to WCCA, we are immensely grateful to be bursary recipients, which makes this possible for us. Along with many other families, we are the beneficiaries of God’s provision through the generosity of donors.

- Samuel Yeung

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