Religion: Protestant Parochials

In search of religious training for their children, more & more U.S. Protestants have been turning to their parochial schools. Last week, at a meeting of the International Council of Religious Education in Columbus, Ohio, Evangelical Lutheran Pastor Clarence Peters of St. Louis submitted some statistics to prove the point. Enrollment in parochial schools supported by three Lutheran groups, Mennonites and Seventh-Day Adventists reached 133,366 in 1947, an increase of nearly 40% over 1937.*

For seven days, the 1,200-odd representatives of 40 U.S. and Canadian denominations talked and listened to each other. In the end, they firmly rejected parochial schools. The council recommended: 1) that Protestant parochial schools be discouraged as “a serious threat” to public education and democracy; 2) that the cultural and nonsectarian aspects of religion be taught through such subjects as history and literature in the public school curriculum; 3) that weekday religious education on a “released time” basis be continued.

* From 1938 to 1948 public school enrollment decreased from 25,975,000 to 24,101,000 (7.2%); enrollment in Roman Catholic parochial schools increased from 2,431,000 to 2,519,000 (3.6%).