The Mississippi Reading Miracle

Gary discusses education and how children are being taught today compared to 50 years ago.

If we follow modern histories of education in the time leading up to and following the Reformation, science took a back seat to progress. The main line of argument is that the study of science was antithetical to the study of the Bible. Of course, this is contrary to the facts of history. Most of the finest scientists of the era were devout Christians, and those that did not profess any particular religious affiliation still operated within the context of a Christian worldview where the world made sense because it was believed to be created by God.[1] The world was rational because God was rational.

In cultures where progress was made in mathematics, science, medicine, political theory, and law, people assumed that the world was not an illusion, that truth mattered, and man was a rational being created by a rational God even though at times man behaved irrationally and believed irrational things. Cultures that believed that spirits inhabited trees, rocks, and animals made very little progress culturally and scientifically because they never knew what the spirits might do. There was never a guarantee that what people did one day could be repeated on another day. They were at the mercy of what they believed were impersonal forces controlled by capricious gods who were always changing the rules.

These false operational assumptions meant that the world could not be studied in a reliable and systematic way. “As long as nature commands religious worship, dissecting her is judged impious. As long as the world is charged with divine beings and powers, the only appropriate response is to supplicate them or ward them off.”[2] As a result, technological, medical, scientific, and moral progress came to a standstill in cultures where people could not agree on basic operating assumptions of how and why things work the way they do. Biblical presuppositions about how the world worked changed the way the cosmos was studied.

Whoever Controls the Schools Rules the World

It’s been said that “the philosophy of the classroom in this generation will be the philosophy of life in the next generation.” Our earliest founding fathers understood this. That’s why, after building homes and churches, they established educational institutions like Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Dartmouth. Over time, most Christians have adopted the false premise that facts are neutral. They believe it doesn’t matter who teaches math, science, and history, because facts are facts. The humanists took advantage of this type of thinking by gradually shaping and controlling education in terms of materialist assumptions.

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Gary discusses education and how children are being taught today compared to 50 years ago. Tried and true methods like memorizing math facts and phonics are being replaced by “new” methods that were promised to work better. They haven’t, and states like Mississippi are going back to the “old” ways and seeing great improvements.

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[1] Rodney Stark, For the Glory of God (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003), 198–199.

[2] Nancy R. Pearcey and Charles B. Thaxton, The Soul of Science: Christian Faith and Natural Philosophy (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1994), 24.

American Vision’s mission is to Restore America to its Biblical Foundation—from Genesis to Revelation. American Vision (AV) has been at the heart of worldview study since 1978, providing resources to exhort Christian families and individuals to live by a Biblically based worldview. Visit www.AmericanVision.org for more information, content and resources