The Purpose and Goal of Education

A soul aflame with knowledge is a soul that wonders.

At this year’s Mass of the Holy Spirit, Fr. Michael Rennier—chaplain and theology teacher—shared a beautiful homily on the purpose and goal of education, inspired by his time with the students of Chesterton Academy of St. Louis.

"The philosopher Plutarch, in his treatise on education, says, "The mind is not a vessel that needs filling, but wood that needs igniting.” I wonder if the typical American conception of education isn’t quite the opposite, that there are a certain number of texts, a canonical syllabus of sorts, that must be read, studied, and commented upon. The speculative content of the texts must be gotten into the minds of - when we’re talking about high-schoolers - somewhat reluctant recipients. We’re in a rush to cram intellectual learning into those wonderful minds of theirs (In the meantime, they’re asking me questions in class along the lines of “If we receive perfected bodies after the final judgment, does that mean we can all be D1 athletes in Heaven?” But I digress).

Plutarch, in any case, is having none of it. Chesterton, I hasten to add, really isn’t either. His explanation of education isn’t the passing on of one or two particular skills or ideas but, rather, it is the gifting of a whole world, a miraculous world of imagination that suggests the first fragmentary hint of a philosophy. For Chesterton, education is, more than anything, the shining of a light. The light illuminates wonder, which pushes us towards true knowledge. Imagination, he says, is the opposite of illusion. We arrive to knowledge by dreaming true, and what is the true dream if not the hope poured into the world by the Logos? What is the truth if not Christ himself?

What if the mind isn’t an empty container for intellectual concepts so much as it is part and parcel of an integrated human person, and an education, while it encompasses speculative knowledge, contains within its gift a far more profound connection with the Truth?

Knowledge sparks and throws off light and heat. It transfigures. This means, by definition, that knowledge manifests in more realms than the intellectual. It is found, to be sure, in the rigors of intellectual formation (students, we do want you to do your homework) but it is also in aesthetics, and virtue, and culture, and the spiritual life."

Read the rest of Fr. Rennier's homily on his blog here.

It is a long-standing tradition in the Church to invoke the Holy Spirit at the beginning of the school year. At Chesterton Academy of St. Louis, this Mass also serves as the occasion for the faculty to make their public Oath of Fidelity to the Magisterium.