TEACHING CONFUSED WITH 'LEARNING' IN IRELAND

0 my old friend John D. Sheridan (staunch defender of the Faith and Capitalism) sees fit to "crime" me again (Nov. 5), this time for endorsing or seeming to endorse Dr. E. M. Walsh's views on Christian education.
John may well be right since he has spent most of his life in the business, whereas my experience of formal education consisted of twelve years during which it was drilled into my sullen, questioning mind that (a) outside of the one true Roman Catholic Church there was no salvation; and (b) that it was the duty of brave young Irishmen to hate the British Empire and all its works and pomps. Most of my close school companions, having more courage than I, put the second precept into practice, some at the cost of their lives, in 1916 and after.
But the tree is known by its fruit. Look at the North of Ireland. For that matter, look at the South where a Benedictine Sister from the U.S., at the end of a sabbatical year (see The Furrow' October, 1971) finds us sadly lacking in all those things which Christian education ought to have given us.
Could it be that Ivan D. Illich is right, that the "deschooling" of education is what we really need? For it is true that under the present dispensation "the pupil is 'schooled' to confuse teaching with learning, grade advancement with education, a diploma with competence, and fluency with the ability to say something new. His imagination is `schooled' to accept service in place of value.
"Medical treatment is mistaken for health care, social work for the improvement of community life, police protection for safety, military poise for national security, the rat race for productive work. Health, learning, dignity, independence, and creative endeavour are defined as little more than the performance of the institutions which claim to serve these ends .. ."
But is there not an "inbetween" way, a joint effort by Christians of all denominations to provide a preparation for this life and the •next in accordance with the principles which each professes to accept?
Gabriel Fallon Dublin 9.