Listen or watch this service here.https://fb.watch/6r9MIzNr3D/
A Sermon By Rev. Whitney Bruno for LCUCPC – June 27, 2021 – Mark 5: 21-43
“Not As Simple as ABC, 123”
Education is political. Perhaps Canadians understand this the most. Canada Day is a time to reflect on our history and how we got here. A time to celebrate our country; but also a time to mourn. Every country, like every person, has a past that is full of wonderful and horrible things. Canada is no different. This is a political holiday – a holiday not based on a religion – and so what better time than now to embrace the politics of education? To take the holiday weekend to learn something?
So why is education political? Let’s dive into Canadian history!
Education here traditionally was done at home – parents taught their kids what their children needed to know to continue to survive. Survival was the goal – if reading didn’t help you through the winter, then reading wasn’t needed. New France’s Catholic churches in the towns and cities began to host catechism classes for the settlers. This meant some basic education. Boys could continue on into law or clergy and get more education. But, to the churches’ frustration, both the indigenous peoples and the settlers had little interest in school. It just… didn’t increase survival rates. You have to remember this is the 1600s. A “full life” was reaching about 32 years old.
Jarius in our reading today is so desperate for his daughter to survive he is willing to sacrifice his reputation as a leader of the synagogue to go to the untried, wandering rabbi Jesus to beg for help.
The woman who touches Jesus’ robe is so desperate for survival she pushes through the crowds and risks the fury of a holy man (and angry crowd).
Survival drives a lot of our concerns.
In the late 1600s, Ursuline nuns arrived and set up rural all-girls schools. Ironically, this meant girls ended up with better educations that boys because in the city a boy tended to leave school as soon as he could get a job and came back to school when the job ended. There weren’t as many opportunities for the girls on the farms to work outside of the home. So they tended to be in class more often. (This was a BIG scandal to the British! How could the French settlers abide their women be the men and better educated?!)
Now you know at the turn of the century, the big 1700s, British settlers began to arrive in larger numbers. New France was conquered by Britain, and the Constitutional Act founded Upper and Lower Canada. Almost immediately a new school system was dreamed of and implemented. A school system where Protestant values were taught — not Catholic. Where English was spoken — not French. Where teachers were paid and not ran by church volunteers. This meant school for… only the wealthy. And New France was NOT going to support this second British invasion.
The language we teach in; the values we teach; who teaches; and who qualifies for education are all political. This is investing into our future and who we will be.
Every Sunday, we are educating ourselves. We are sharing values. Language. Who is present, and who is absent, is part of us. We are writing our tomorrows by how we live today. What kind of world do we want to live in to? Here, we confess we want to live into the reign of God. A world of justice, peace, mercy, and diversity. A world of plenty.
Most of our ancestors felt the reign of God was an all-or-nothing war. Only their own heritage was correct, was Godly, was the right way.
The goal of education became to force everyone to assimilate, become, one people, one country, with one language. But which language? Which religion? Catholic French, or a Protestant English? The many indigenous peoples, and the settlers from non-English speaking countries, did not have a say. The values of countries other than Great Britain or France were not considered. The other peoples were not considered peoples.
The War of 1812 interrupted the calls to revise education in Canada. When it was brought up again, the government declared funding for any community with 20 or more kids. Well, there were so many they couldn’t fund them all. So once Upper and Lower Canada became United Canada, a new school act placed the first non-denominational schools were founded and funded in this area – and a dual school system of Catholic and Protestant in former Lower Canada was established. This system was supported by taxes. Now no child was excluded based on income.
That just wouldn’t do for the middle and upper classes. Remember the schools were focused on creating a single identity, culture, language, values. What would a lower class Irish settler teach an upper class Wales child? What kind of influences were the indigenous children going to have on the white children? Private schools popped up to protect children from the less desirable influences of other classes. That’s still going on in… most countries I can think of. Private schools also could take donations from churches, or businesses, and all of this changed who was educated, how they were educated, and what they learned.
A generation later there were still stark differences in education among the French-settled areas and the British-settled areas. Assimilation had not happened. A tougher hand was used to make the “peasants” of former New France Anglicized with only approved curriculum, outside of the Catholic church, with taxes on any family with children to support the approved teaches.
Remember how I said we do ridiculous things for the people we love?
With the repression of all French-Catholic Canadian heritage, schoolhouses began to be burned. School master’s horses maimed. There was mass refusal to send kids to schools or pay taxes. All of this was wrapped up in several of Canada’s rebellions.
This era was called the Candle Snuffer’s War. As in, the attempt to snuff out the enlightenment light of British education and fall into the darkness and ignorance of Catholic Darkness.
Do you see HOW we teach something affects HOW we think about it? This is the edition in the official books. I was reading The Sociology of Education in Canada. What was this time called from the French-Canadian perspective? Would it be the Candle Snuffer’s War as in… refusing to let their children’s culture, language, religion, and way of life be snuffed out by the British-Canadians?
… How is it that British-Canadians and French-Canadians both were so terrified of their children being indoctrinated and unlike themselves… and yet did that very same thing to the indigenous peoples? To the Asian immigrants? To the Indian immigrants?
The school system as your grandparents knew it was founded with the passing of the Constitution Act — the very act we are recognizing this weekend. Specifically in this new dominion’s constitution is the enshrinement of education, and giving that charge to each province to manage. That ended the war on French in Quebec, but began it in Ontario.
In Ontario, English was mandated as the language of education until the 1960s. That means… no French. No Anishinaabemowin. No native tongues of any immigrants. Education here in Ontario became compulsory — mandatory — for all children.
Memorizing ancient poems and writing perfect letters didn’t seem to fit the lives of many children, and so schools changed to allow “life skills” to be taught. Who needed life skills instead of reading, writing, and arithmetic? Any child who seemed slow of learning. Who were the slowest learners? Those listening to the teacher speak in a language they couldn’t comprehend.
Until the 1960s, anyone with English as a second language was immediately at an education disadvantage. And each year the difference between the students being taught how to cook, clean, mend, and mow was greater than the students being taught how to lead, read, write, and orate. The leaders then who made the rules were chosen from the young adults who had the skills – skills they developed as children.
This is what is said by a racist system. A system – not any one individual – that keeps a group of people disadvantaged. The system itself favors. And THATS why it is so hard to change ourselves from exclusionary to inclusionary. It isn’t you or me learning all of this. It is all of us learning it, and then changing the rules, the culture, the language, the values we share.
It means changing our definition and ideal of a Canadian.
It is a threat to identity.
I’m new here. You know this. But the very same conversation is happening in the USA. Who is American? What language is American? The same conversation is happening in the EU. What is European? Who are we with so many Middle Eastern immigrants?
This same conversation happened with our ancestors when they fought whether our schools would be in French or in English. They chose an everything-or-nothing winner-takes-all battle.
We are awakening that we don’t have to think out of scarcity. We don’t have to assume the other intends to annihilate us and plan to annihilate them first.
A lot of our scripture is about taking impossible situations where there’s no way forward, and showing us a third way. A graceful way. The Godly way.
Jesus called it the narrow way. The wide way is the way everyone takes. The easiest. The narrow has to be sought. Has to be found. It is the hardest.
Jarius’ daughter is dead. There’s no way forward. Stop pestering the rabbi. It is ridiculous to think a miracle could happen here.
The woman is bleeding and shall be forever. She won’t pester the rabbi. It is ridiculous to think she can be healed without pestering him.
In both cases, Jesus lauds the faith he witnesses. Jarius and his wife keep hope, keep faith, keep seeking for a way forward. The woman keeps faith, and hope, and pushes a way forward. All are willing to look ridiculous in order to obtain healing.
I hear in these words an encouragement for us, too. If we’re willing to be a bit ridiculous, to keep that radical hope, and seek healing… God responds. Jesus leads. The Spirit settles.
The hardest way forward is the way of valuing other people’s languages, cultures, and identities while also valuing our own. It looks ridiculous. It is chaotic and not uniform.
The most narrow, most hidden way is the one where we made room for all the colors of people and don’t assimilate them. Don’t ask them to change. The Godly way is meeting someone where they are, and love them. Wishing them to thrive in a way that is loving, and looks like thriving TO THEM.
We need different things to thrive. The new reality we are in is we no longer assume we have to have everyone be identical to be a country. We no longer have to have everyone look the same, speak the same, think the same. This awakening is happening in many countries. And it is good.
Schools are still where culture, identity, values, and ways of understanding are shaped. But we’re having our own snuffed candle brought back to life. We’re realizing diversity makes us stronger. Makes us more resilient. Makes us able to adapt and change.
In healing and bringing Jarius’ daughter back to life, the town was changed. Hope given. A new beginning. Literally new life for the girl and a healed family. In healing the woman, the woman was restored to society, given her life back.
In our community, as we learn about our past bravely and face the good and bad we’ve done, we are changed. Hope is given. We are gifted a way forward where we are one society, made of many languages, many faiths, many heritages. And it is very good.
Pastor Whitney Bruno Sermons 