By Shafer Parker

If you’ve been following this blog over the past couple of months you probably remember some of the topics Doug Wilson has covered in his effort to explain “How to Build Christian Communities that Save the World.” But just in case you missed the first six entries, let me list those topics for you. In the intro he argues that we’ve been so blessed, for so long, that most Canadians have forgotten how our national benefits are God’s blessings, stemming from centuries of faithful, Christian obedience. In Chapter 1 Wilson declares that the “the root of every rebellion (in every culture) must always be identified as pride, and the lust for autonomy (self-government). Wilson goes on to list eight symptoms of today’s lust for autonomy, including: secularism, Darwinism (evolution), egalitarianism, the divorce between science and values, relativism, subjectivism, the despotism of feelings, and finally “admiration of the cool kids”—thanks for nothing Tik Tok. (If you want further explanations of these symptoms, go back to the original blog.)

In Chapter 2 Wilson calls for the creation of a genuinely Christian culture to counter that of the world, a kind of spiritual fortress from which Christians go out to do battle for the souls of men. Chapter 3 reckons with the importance of church membership in order to guard against “radical individualism” and in order to be a cohesive team standing in unity for the gospel and public righteousness. Chapter 4 covers the uniquely biblical approach to love and justice (Hint, these crucial elements of a blessed culture are not what the world says they are. Sadly enough, you may have no idea what Jesus meant by “love your neighbour as yourself”). And, finally, for purposes of this list, Chapter 5 discusses the importance of building Christian community beyond church walls.

This list is important, because much of what Wilson writes so far, while original in expression, is still the kind of thing that Christians can nod along with, agreeing in their hearts that it’s a real shame we’re not doing better at these things (Wilson will never be accused of plagiarism; no one writes like him). But in today’s chapter Wilson explains in clear terms why suddenly, at the beginning of the 21st century, our culture needs saving. Then he offers the one remedy, without which all other efforts to build world-saving communities will remain useless. Here, I suspect, a lot of readers will find themselves disagreeing with him—strongly, if not violently.

I hear you. You’re saying to yourself, “Whatever in the world could cause such pushback?” Well, in part it’s Wilson’s non-compromising spirit. But even more difficult to handle is the nagging thought that despite the offensiveness of his position, soon to be revealed, he is probably right. Here’s what I’m getting at. He proves beyond fear of contradiction that if Christian parents care about their children’s spiritual well being, they should never ever put them in public schools. Not only that, but he also states plainly, and proves, as far as I’m concerned, that the principle of never putting would-be Christian children in public schools should have been applied from the very beginning of public schools, all the way back in the middle of the 19th century.

Here's a sample of Wilsonian logic. First, he starts with Scripture: “We have it on good authority that we cannot harvest figs from thorn bushes (Luke 6:44),” he writes. “The kind of seed you put in the ground has a great deal to do with what kind of crop comes up at you out of the ground (Gal. 6:7).” He then applies the principle in ridiculous ways. “Rendering general by induction,” he writes, “we may infer that it is also not possible to gather pink grapefruit from your juniper bushes, or pine nuts from your tomato plants.” Nor does he stop with agricultural comparisons. “You cannot send [your children] to a culinary school and expect to get back a mechanical engineer. You cannot send them to art school and wonder why your son never became a doctor like you wanted. . . . We often act astonished when we have no right whatsoever to be surprised in any way. We say, wide-eyed with Aaron, that all we did was put in a bunch of gold, and ‘out came this calf’ (Exod. 32:24). That has to be one of the lamest excuses in the Bible, and here we are, still using it.”

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Wilson becomes concerned that we, his readers, may fail to apply his point properly. So he does it for us. “Lest I be accused of being too oblique in the point I am seeking to make, you cannot send all the Christian kids off to be educated in a school system that is riddled with rank unbelief, shot through with relativism, and diseased with perverse sexual fantasies, and then wonder at the results you get. And why are you not allowed to wonder about it? Because God is not mocked.” If that isn’t clear enough, Wilson quotes Voddie Baucham, “We cannot continue to send our children to Caesar for their education and be surprised when they come home as Romans.”

But all that bad stuff only started in the late 20th century, someone may say. Surely all parents need do is get active in the schools to bring them back to their original purpose of teaching the three r’s – ‘readin,’ ‘ritin,’ and ‘rithmetic.’ Wilson is having none of that and demonstrates his position by quoting from mid-19th-century thinkers who foresaw from the beginning that public schools would inevitably lead to today’s moral and educational crisis. First, he quotes theologian R. L. Dabney (1820 – 1898) writing against the newly proposed public-school concept in the United States: “Christians must prepare themselves then for the following results: all Bibles, prayers and catechisms will ultimately be driven out of the schools.”

Which raises the question, how could Dabney speak with such prophetic accuracy? Wilson let’s theologian A. A. Hodge (1823 – 1886) answer the question. “It is capable of exact demonstration that if every party in the State has the right of excluding from the public schools whatever he does not believe to be true, then he that believes most must give way to him that believes least, and then he that believes least must give way to him that believes absolutely nothing, no matter in how small a minority the atheists or agnostics may be. It is self-evident that on this scheme, if it is consistently and persistently carried out in all parts of the country, the United States system of national popular education will be the most efficient and wide instrument for the propagation of Atheism which the world has ever seen.” Does anyone dare accuse Hodge of getting it wrong? I thought not.

Then, to all the hopeful government education fanatics, Wilson delivers the coup de grace. “We are now arriving where a godless education must necessarily go,” he writes. “The public schools in America were not secular, they were godless. The public schools in America were not neutral, they were godless. The public schools in America were not even agnostic, they were godless.” But Wilson’s concerns don’t apply in Alberta, or even most of Canada, someone may say. On the prairies, at least, our public schools were established as Catholic and Protestant, obviously both Christian. To that I can only reply, was there ever a time [in public education] when the principle of the tyranny of the least common denominator, spiritually speaking, didn’t apply? And I answer, if ever there was, it was long before your grandparents first drew breath.

This article is too long already, so I’ll finish up by saying, Wilson is just as strong in this chapter in telling Christians what to do if they want their children to grow up as God-fearing believers. They must be “instructed in every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. These things are not optional.” To make that possible Wilson offers links to a variety of avenues toward Christian education. But please, never doubt that a truly Christian education is necessary. “In order to have a flourishing Christian community,” Wilson writes, “it is necessary for the children of that community to have a shared experience of godly education.” And that’s the truth.

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