Parental Rights & Responsibilities...

There is an excellent letter in this week's Catholic Herald, in which Edmund Adamus, director of the department for pastoral affairs of the Diocese of Westminster, highlights the dangers posed by some of the recent attempts to introduce mandatory sex education in this country.

Mr. Adamus points out that there are striking similarities between the stealthy undermining of parental authority by the state today (particularly the authority of Christian parents) and the aggressive subversion of the same in National Socialist Germany in the 1930s.

He also points out that three families in Germany have recently been charged and convicted under a law, introduced by Adolf Hitler in 1938, which outlaws homeschooling. The parents tried to exercise their legal right to withdraw their children from sex education classes where content was at odds with their moral convictions.

Although homeschooling is not illegal in Britain, it is being made more difficult. At present, if a child has never been to school, the Local Authority has no right to interfere in the child's education. Once a child has been to school, the Local Authority has the right to visit the child at home to carry out inspections. This is a loophole which the government is seeking to close. There are also calls to make it impossible for parents to withdraw their children from sex education classes... and, surprisingly, the Catholic Education Service is quite happy with this idea.

Pius XI protested against the erosion of parental rights in 1930s Germany. Pope John Paul II informed parents that their rights included the unrenounceable responsibility to protect their children's morality... the Catholic Education Service, if it is to continue calling itself Catholic, has no right to hand over responsibility for our children's moral education to the State.

Twitch of the mantilla to John Smeaton.