Today, I want to share with you a great insight from C.S.Lewis who reminds us that as educators we can do a great deal to bring the waters of truth, beauty, goodness and wisdom into the lives of our students.

Well, Hey everybody.

Jonathan Doyle with you.

Once again, welcome friends to the Catholic teacher daily podcast.

Really great to have a few moments of your company.

It's a great privilege that you would, I guess, lavish the gift

of time upon this humble podcast.

I, the older I get, the more that I think that the real commodity I'm convinced

that the real commodity in life is time.

Uh, we can generate all sorts of other resources and access,

all sorts of other resources.

But the great limiter in life, uh, is it not true is time that, especially in this

season, so we're in lockdown here still.

So once I get out of the studio, it's homeschooling for me, three kids.

And, uh, getting back to my teaching roots as I worked through a, uh, a whole bunch

of stuff with each of them each day, we're doing times tables with my younger kids.

And, uh, I have a boxing background, believe it or not.

So I've got the boxing gloves on with the kids.

And, uh, the boxing focus pads, and I'm doing times tables with boxing.

So it's like, you know, Just got, they're getting their punch combinations on

while learning the, uh, the times tables.

So that's what I'll be doing in a few hours.

I want to share with you today.

Really great quote from CS Lewis, you know, the.

The longer I leave again, he's he really is a giant.

He really is one of those.

Communicators thinkers, philosophers.

Theologians that really has had a profound impact.

You know, I think he's real gift.

Was that not only was he intellectually brilliant?

But his ability to make his ideas accessible.

Uh, you know, just, you've obviously got the Narnia Chronicles in his

fiction writing, but, uh, he was able to take these incredibly rich ideas

and make them accessible to people.

You know, and he's a guy that also lived with a lot of suffering.

You.

I had a lot of loss in his life.

Um, ACO.

He was not.

Immune to the difficulties and challenges of a human.

Human life.

But I want to share this beautiful quote that I came across this morning.

He says the task of the modern educator.

That's us guys.

The task of the modern modern educator is not to cut down jungles.

But to irrigate deserts.

The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, but to irrigate deserts.

I think that's a really.

Interesting observation, this idea of irrigating deserts.

And as I first read it, I was drawn to the thought.

That much modern curriculum and much modern schooling is very instrumentalist.

It's very utilitarian.

I've been saying this for a very long time that we.

We have compressed the human experience of education into its

instrumentalist goals, which means.

Our schooling systems and I'm not specifically, or my Catholic education.

You're talking about the broad education landscape.

Has been.

I guess.

How would you sort of it's it's not being allowed to flow widely

in a broadly human concept of.

What it means to be human, that encounter with truth, beauty,

goodness, knowledge, wisdom.

It's become very much about shaping young people to be inputs into the.

I.

I guess the college and economic system so that our school systems are

shaped to basically get children the highest possible grades so that they

can get into the best possible courses.

And then.

Get the best possible jobs.

And I know some of you listening will go, well, what's wrong with that?

Isn't that a good thing that people can learn what's necessary for

our society and get good jobs.

I go absolutely.

It's a very useful thing.

The ability to be able to work and to provide for the needs of life

is a really crucial thing, but let's not dilute ourselves that

that's all education is about.

Education in a Catholic context is discipleship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

It's coming to understand what it means to be fully human.

It's learning about truth, beauty and goodness and wisdom.

And, um, you know how to live the, the spiritual life.

So there's a much wider landscape.

See with me, I'm saying that we've probably lost that wider

Vista of education in some sense.

And made it more instrumentalist and utilitarian.

Now that's why I like this idea from CS Lewis.

The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, but to irrigate deserts.

My thesis this morning is that there is many deserts in the lives of our young

people, desserts of knowledge, and where this has come up for me recently is I'm

teaching my daughter here under lockdown.

One of my daughters.

She's about, uh, 11.

And we've been working through this beautiful history book.

And we've been, I said this yesterday, studying.

Uh, the ancient civilizations.

So we're looking at Sumeria.

And, uh, you know, the early Semitic tribes of, uh, Mesopotamia and all

this stuff, and she is just alive.

She's just so interested and engaged.

With what she's learning.

And, uh, it's an awareness that there's this kind of desert in many young

people have all this information and knowledge and history that is just.

You know, often not being explored.

So I want to encourage you today to think about.

The potential deserts in the lives of your own students.

Now, these could be deserts of faith, of beauty of joy.

I remember teaching once and.

Uh, playing, uh, Tchaikovsky's 18, 12 overture on full volume, as we were

talking about, I think Russian history and, you know, just this ability

to blast incredibly famous pieces of music into their consciousness.

You know, it was a joy to kind of.

Bring something into their awareness that they hadn't thought of before.

So think about.

Your own students, where do you think there might be some desserts

in the lives of your students?

You know, what art do they not know about?

What music have they never heard?

What.

Spiritual practice of they never encountered.

And I really think that Jesus can use you powerfully in that context.

So, yes, we need to teach the syllabus.

Yes.

We need to teach the curriculum.

Yes.

We need to give them literacy and numeracy skills.

I'm not for a moment discounting that those are important things.

You know, as I've been suddenly having to teach maths to my own kids.

I've been aware that, you know, just a simple thing, like you

cannot do mathematics as a child without times tables.

And I'm sure there's all sorts of fancy ways to do it, but

really it's rote learning.

And so I've learned that there isn't a huge.

A huge need for structure and for aspects of rote learning.

So again, you hear me, I'm not discounting that we need to teach

these important fundamental skills.

But we must not lose sight of the much bigger Vista of what it means to be human.

So friends, can I encourage you today to pray upon the irrigation of

deserts in the lives of your students?

Where is Jesus calling you to bring life giving water into the

lives of your students today?

Take a risk, do something, you know,

Usually, if you, if you just focus on the areas that you're

passionate about, you'll be fine.

Whatever lights you up, you'll be able to communicate with energy.

I think that's a simple thing to say, whatever lights you up, you will

be able to communicate with energy.

So that's it from me.

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All right friends.

I really enjoyed doing this that I hope it's a blessing to you.

Thank you for what you're doing in Catholic education.

May the Lord carry you today?

May the spirit guide you.

It may Mary, the mother of Jesus intercede for you and your family at all times.

Well, there you go.

My name is Jonathan Doyle.

This has been the Catholic teacher daily podcast.

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