The outcome of your education can shape who you became
This is the opinion of Br. Denys Janiga, OSB, a monk of Saint John's Abbey and a Benedictine Fellow at SJUfaith
In 2010, “The Publican” (online journal and blog) interviewed James Matthew Wilson—assistant professor in the Humanities department at Villanova University—to discuss the liberal arts and John Henry Newman.
Wilson made a trenchant claim: “Catholic universities love to talk about the complementarity of faith and reason, but they tend to underscore this relation precisely so that they can justify as acceptably Catholic all kinds of effectively not reasonable but rationalistic projects.”
He was alluding to a growing practice where STEM departments are framed as furthering the Catholic partnership of faith and reason, but the rational is actually made central while faith is marginalized.
Separating reason from the transcendent leads to what Pope Francis calls the technocratic paradigm: a worldview that prioritizes technology, science and efficiency over human values, ethics and care for the earth.
This means that knowledge focused on receiving with wonder God’s creation is replaced with a powerful apparatus aimed at controlling it.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher and statesmen, stated that “knowledge is power.” This is the trademark of the technocratic paradigm.
How does this relate to John Henry Newman and the liberal arts? Newman lived in the 19th century. Having converted from Anglicanism to Catholicism, he was appointed rector of the Catholic University of Ireland and eventually cardinal.
He delivered a series of lectures at that university titled “The Idea of a University.” The cultural context these lectures responded to was the rise of utilitarianism, a philosophy that held different views on education compared to the liberal arts tradition of the Catholic faith that Newman championed.
Utilitarianism reduces knowledge to what is immediately useful for economic and social benefits, whereas the liberal arts focus on the formation of persons with spacious minds guided by the capacity to wonder and engage in critical thinking.
The technocratic paradigm incorporates utilitarianism insofar as it does not seek the good itself but what appears beneficial to the greatest number of people, whether it be good or not.
In the field of education, then, what counts is the outcome, what one gets from it, the increase of power one acquires in the marketplace and the technologically framed needs that it satisfies. For Newman, however, knowledge is an end in itself that shapes character.
Rather than asking, “What kind of job will this program get me?” one asks, “What kind of person will I become?”
Another idea his lectures focused on is the interconnected nature of disciplines.
The liberal arts and sciences do not hide behind walls; they are interrelated precisely because they are guided by the search for truth. Moreover, Newman contended that theology is crucial for Catholic education since its nature involves exploring meaning, unity, morality and purpose.
Without these questions education becomes merely useful. How do you see the liberal arts and sciences interacting in your studies? What role does theology play? Is there more to education than getting a job? Next week we look at Vatican II and Catholic education. Peace.