A Spirituality Of Character Formation

Character Formation 1
Copyright © 2004 Daniel J. Ribera
A Spirituality of Character Formation
Daniel Ribera
Seminar in Educational Values, EDU 7910
Greg Fritzberg, PhD
Seattle Pacific University
Summer 2004
(Submitted December 10, 2004)
A Position Paper

Abstract
In ASpirituality of Character Formation, Ribera presented four affirmations to frame the
discussion about character education: 1) Character formation is the responsibility of the home,
the church, and the state, 2) Character formation is a spiritual endeavor, 3) Character formation
addresses standards, motives, and ends, and 4) Character formation makes room for ambiguity,
tension, and paradox. In the course of the discussion Ribera interacted with several prominent
voices in the field of character education, namely Alfie Kohn, David Purpel, and Glenn Tinder.
In addition, Ribera made use of a triadic framework of prophet, priest, and king, and integrated
the ethical work of thinkers like: C. S. Lewis, Cornelius Van Til, and Louis P. Pojman.

A Spirituality of Character Formation
Introduction
Alfie Kohn critiques the efforts of “those who simply want to help children become
decent human beings and may not have thought carefully about what they are being offered”
(Kohn, 2003, p. 180). My response is three-fold: First, from the literature and through experience
one would conclude that there is nothing simple about helping children become decent human
beings. If the task were simple, Kohn’s critique of the current efforts might not be so urgent.
Second, there seems to be little agreement about what constitutes a decent human being. Core
values vary from Meier and Schwartz’s two: “empathy and skepticism” (Kohn, 2003, p. 185), to
Purpel’s three: “justice, love, and community” (Purpel, 1991a, p. 50), to the six pillars of
character (Character Counts Coalition, n.d.), to Kevin Ryan’s seven guiding principles (Center
for the Advancement of Ethics and Character, n.d.), to the eight natural laws of Lewis’s Tao
(Lewis, 1947), to the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:1-17), to thirty traits and hundreds of
stories of Character Education Lessons (Legacy Educational Resources, n.d.). This is just a
sampling of the diverse options and voices in the character education conversation today. Third,
the offerings in the field of character education to help young people become decent human
beings are numerous and wide-ranging. This paper is not intended to add to the offerings, but is
my own attempt to do what Kohn says is missing, that is, to think carefully about what is being
offered.
1. Character Formation is the Responsibility of the Home, the Church, and the State
Elsewhere, I have written about the relationship between the home, church, and state.
(Ribera, 2003) It was my contention that each institution has a distinct function, and that not one

of the three has exclusive claim on character formation. Ideally, the church, home, and school
would have common goals and the school would complement their efforts. Character education
is most effective when these institutions work in harmony.
The conversation about where character education should take place is important. Most
discussions assume the school to be the primary venue for teaching character and values.
However, it may be that the church, home, and state have aspects in common, which the school
does not share. These three are ordained by God in scripture, they model the nature of the
Godhead, the work of God among His people, and they present a picture of God’s people in
glory. I would like to suggest that these institutions are the primary context in which values and
ethics should be taught and learned. These three represent mankind in its priestly, prophetic, and
kingly offices, and each suggests how character ought to be formed. The school, in a derivative
manner, may provide a context for supporting and assisting the home, church, and state, and
provide a microcosm for teaching, practicing, risking, and learning, but the school is not the
primary agency, nor the definer of values.
God ordained the family for the purpose of modeling the covenant relationship of the
Godhead, and the relationship between Christ and His bride. It is the place where covenant
parents pass on the story of redemption and the faith of their parents to the next generation.
Parents have a prophetic function in the world, telling the story of God and His people. The
family nurtures children and models love. This story and these relationships are essential to
character formation.
Christ ordained the church as the family of God, His body. Its members are called to be
worshippers and to make worshippers of the world. The sacraments and the preaching of the
Word are central to its life. The church serves this priestly function of ministering the grace and

mercy of the cross of Christ to the world. The church produces worshippers of God through
evangelism, missions, discipleship, and diaconal ministries.
God ordained governments to proclaim liberty and justice in the land. The government is
mandated to “bear the sword” (Romans 13:4), an expression that speaks of the use of might for
protection and justice. The government serves this kingly function of ministering righteousness
to its citizens. The state makes and protects citizens.
Christians are not blind to the fact that this trio is far from perfect. Believers are strangers
and pilgrims in a fallen world, and governments are often not faithful partners. It is often
antagonistic to our work, warring against the church and the home. Sin has marred all of God's
good creation, including the institutions that he has ordained. The family and the church, no less
than the state, are affected by sin. All three are created by God, damaged by sin, and are included
in the redemption of Christ. An eschatological perspective may also be suggestive of character
education goals. Although on the last day there will be no marriage, earthly governments will
cease, and the church will be caught up, these institutions will not end; rather, they will come to
fulfillment. In that day, the church will find its rest and joy in worshipping its heavenly Father,
the bride will sit down to the wedding feast with her Savior, and the King of glory will reign with
peace, justice, and joy. In this sense the church, family, and state will be entirely redeemed, and
the earthly models will find completion in the heavenly reality.
The school, like the farm, the factory, the bank, or the software company, is a temporal
institution made by people in the course of being faithful (or unfaithful) stewards on the earth. It
is a part of the cultural mandate. The school supports the church, the home, and the state rather
than replacing them. The school partners with parents as it nurtures caring children who share the
joys and sorrows of others. The school partners with the church to produce worshippers, young

people who hear and understand God speaking through His world and through His word. Pupils
are taught to live and work in the presence of their God. The school also partners with the state to
produce citizens who are sojourners on this earth, who have their true citizenship in heaven, and
who hold lightly to the things of the earth. The school encourages citizens whose goal is to
spread peace and justice in the land. Citizens are to be good stewards of the resources of this
earth. The school is indeed doing the work of character formation, in partnership with the home,
church, and the state.
This discussion raises additional questions about the relationship between church and
state in a less than ideal society, as well as, concerns of religious establishment within the
schools.
2. Character Formation is a Spiritual Endeavor
The premise of this section is that character formation cannot help but be a spiritual
process. “Character is formed,” says James Davidson Hunter, “in relation to convictions…”
(Hunter, 2000, xiii). Purpel encourages us to “avoid contributing to the myth of value-free
education” (Purpel, 1997, p. 260). The following account, rather than recounting the relationship
between religion in public education in a pluralistic society (Fraser, 1999), provides a
perspective of those who sought schooling for their children in which faith and learning was
integrated, during the time when spiritual influence in the public schools was waning.
Originally, Common Schools were supportive or at least accommodating of the
integration of faith and learning, but as our society has become more pluralistic the separation
that was built into the founding documents have been interpreted and applied in favor of
secularization. (Fraser, 1999)

In the United States, religion has often been closely related to education. The state
founded schools with religious ends in mind. Massachusetts’ Old Deluder Satan Law of 1647
started with these words, “It being one chief project of that old deluder Satan to keep men from
the knowledge of the Scriptures” (Massachusetts’ Old Deluder Satan Law, 1647/2001, p. 8).
Students who learned to read could study the scriptures and thus find salvation. Young readers
would follow courses of study unabashedly informed by religion. The New England Primer
included this entry for the letter W: “Whales in the Sea, God’s voice Obey” (The New England
Primer, 1727/2001, p. 15). The clear message is that whatever was to be learned about the
creation would be referenced back to the Creator, and thus was moral knowledge.
Early educational movements in America had roots in the faith life of the community.
From the stated intention to convert native peoples and baptize slaves, to passing laws designed
to counter the deceptions of Satan through publicly funded schools, to publishing texts complete
with catechisms, the evidence points to schooling that was quite comfortable with its religious
heritage and association. “Religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good
government and the happiness of mankind, schools and means of education shall forever be
encouraged,” said the Northwest Ordinance as Americans moved west of the Ohio River (United
States Congress, 1787/2001, p. 46; Urban & Wagoner, 2004, pp. 77-78). It was not uncommon
for United States educational mandates to have character formation as a central goal.
Tension existed between the Constitution of the United States that sought to protect
against the establishment of a state Church, and the founders of the Common School who
seemed comfortable with publicly funded schools that were infused with religion. “Congress
shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof….” said the first amendment to the Constitution ratified in 1791. The Common School

by definition was for all children, for the common good, but not for religious establishment. Yet
the Bible, which is the text of the Christian religion, was used in the Common School. (Fraser,
1999, 2001)
In his Common Schools, Horace Mann attempted to balance religious content with
assurances that a particular sect would not proselytize. He believed that a person educated in the
Common School would be enabled to judge and choose his own religious obligations. Mann
claimed the schools were not sectarian to the degree that the student would be indoctrinated, or
pressured to join a denomination. (Mann, 1848/1957) Fraser called this “lowest-common-
denominator Christianity” (Fraser, 1999, p. 6).
In New York, in 1840, Catholics petitioned for a share of the Common School fund.
Roman Catholics clearly saw the nature of the publicly funded school system was not neutral as
Mann would have them believe. The public schools of New York were Protestant in nature, so to
one of Catholic faith that meant un-Catholic, if not anti-Catholic. New York City Public Schools
are described as a “Protestant monopoly.” Catholics parents were not happy that their children
were not receiving the religious education they wanted for them. (Third Plenary Council of
Baltimore, 1884/2001) The belief that there was no such thing as a non-sectarian faith is
instructive for us today as we consider how to provide a spiritual context for character education.
The motivation to provide a faith-based education for their children was by no means
limited to Catholics. While Irish Catholics were immigrating to the United States, (by 1847 there
were 37,000 in Boston alone), (Johnston, n.d.) and Horace Mann was preparing his last report to
the Board of Education of Massachusetts (Mann,1848/1957), Dutch immigrants were leaving the
Netherlands in protest over “neutral” state-controlled schools. Like the Catholics, the Dutch
Calvinists sought doctrinally pure schools that taught a worldview consistent with their families

and church. Thus, the Dutch founded schools throughout the United States. (Oppewal, 1963)
Following the thinking of men like Abraham Kuyper and Herman Bavinck the Dutch rejected the
“segregation of home and school resulting from government regulation in education” (Jaarsma,
1935, p. 187).
In addition to the Calvinists and Catholics, we could trace several immigrant groups from
Germany and surrounding countries, many of which desired to establish their own faith-based
schools as an expression of their religious liberty. Restricting our attention to the waves of
immigrants who arrived around Horace Mann’s time we find Jewish immigrants,
Amish/Mennonite immigrants, and German Lutheran immigrants. Not surprisingly, we find
schools organized by all these groups and so there exist Amish, Mennonite schools, Calvinist
schools, Catholic schools, Jewish schools, and Lutheran schools.
As the United States of America and its schools grew numerically, in maturity, and in
diversity it became clear that even the dose of religion that Mann permitted would not be
allowed. (Mann,1848/1957) The opinion of the courts was that the religious content in the
curriculum violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment of the United States
Constitution. (Fraser, 1999, 2001)
Parker Palmer diagnoses “an illness in our culture; it arises from our rigid separation of
the visible world from the powers that undergird and animate it” (Palmer, 1983, p.10). In
Hunter’s analysis the creeds and convictions upon which character was based have been replaced
with secular strategies designed to provide some foundation for moral education and character
building. These strategies include an 1) ethically neutral psychology of personality, 2) a
perennialist return to character traits based in Western civilization’s classics, and 3) a
dependence upon the ideals of democracy and social consensus. (Hunter, 2000)

Interestingly, these three strategies developed by Hunter compare with the prophetic,
priestly, and kingly functions formerly provided by the home, church, and the state, but now
replaced by secular schooling. The psychological strategy resembles an attempt at the priestly
function by ministering the grace of ethical neutrality to human motive, behavior, and
personality. (Hunter, 2000, p. 81-106) The neoclassical strategy resembles the prophetic function
by providing an authoritative voice in the form of “timeless truths,” and stories of civilization.
(Hunter, 2000, p. 107-112) The communitarian strategy resembles the kingly function by
providing confidence in the democratic experience and bonds of participatory citizenship.
(Hunter, 2000, 112-121)
Each of these strategies provides an ineffective counterfeit of the faith-based original.
They are ineffective because they attempt to fill a gap left by the removal of creeds and
convictions, without returning to those creeds and convictions. In addition, they attempt to do in
a fragmented manner that which was accomplished by a cooperative effort of home, church, and
state. In others words the prophetic, priestly, and kingly aspects of the three educative
institutions were never intended to work separately.
We cannot go forward without a transcendent foundation for our ethical enterprise and
character formation. Glenn Tinder (1989) says,
Many would like to think there are no consequences—that we can continue treasuring the
life and welfare, the civil rights and political authority, of every person without believing
in a God who renders such attitudes and conduct compelling. Nietzsche shows that we
cannot. We cannot give up the Christian God—and go on as before. We must give up
Christian morality too. (p. 80)
Let us consider what the foundation and structure of a Christian ethic might look like.

3. Character Formation Addresses Standards, Motives, and Ends
Clive Staples Lewis (1952) described Christian behavior as being concerned with three
things: first, fair play and harmony between individuals, (i.e., relations between man and man),
second, tidying up or harmonizing things inside each individual, (i.e., things inside each man),
and third, the general purpose of human life as a whole: what man was made for, (i.e., relations
between man and the Power that made him.) Lewis wrote that Christian behavior was what one
does with natural inclinations. (Lewis, 1952)
Like Lewis, Cornelius Van Til (1977) described three questions with which Christian
ethics or character was concerned. First, one inquires into the nature of man, specifically Van Til
means the nature of the human will. Under this question he discussed motive. Second, with
respect to the will of man one inquires into the quality of one’s deeds. Under this question Van
Til discussed criterion or standard. Third, with respect to the will of man one inquires as to the
purpose or end of its action. Under this question he discussed the end toward which or for which
something is done. Van Til begins by defining his subject more formally than Lewis. “Ethics,”
according to Van Til, “deals with the aspect of human personality which we designate as the
will” (Van Til, 1977, p. 1).
Louis Pojman (1995) outlined four domains of ethical assessment. First, was the act
itself, and involved questions of whether or not the action was permissible, and obligatory or
optional; second, were the consequences of the action, and involved discussion as to whether the
outcome is good, bad or indifferent; third, is the character of the moral agent or person doing the
action, and whether the person is virtuous or not; and fourth, is the motive or the intention of the
person, or whether the action was motivated by good will or evil will.

The prophetic, priestly, and kingly functions of God’s people described in the description
of the home, church, and state above are also observable in the discussion of standards, motives,
and ends which follows below. Though not intended to be a rigid structure, this triadic
framework may be suggestive of ways to guide the conversation about character education.
The Nature of Man.
One of Kohn’s (1997) objections to the current character education movement is the view
of human nature that is assumed. Kohn says he opposes the bleak, pessimistic view of human
nature that suggests that humans are inclined toward misbehavior and therefore leads to the view
that schools need to take a “fix-the-kids” approach in character education. Kohn sees three
assumptions at work in these programs: 1) that we are at war with ourselves and with others, torn
between our desires and our reason, 2) that we are fundamentally selfish, aggressive, or
otherwise unpleasant, and 3) that these desires are very strong and threaten to overpower us.
(Kohn, 1997, 2003)
Kohn perceives that one’s view of human nature will be at work in the schools, whether
in the public or private sector. In fact, it may be that the question of sin (original sin) may be the
most important issue to address in the field of character education. It goes to the heart of
character formation. Our understanding of the human condition will determine our approach in
education in general and character formation in particular.
Van Til speaks of the nature of man as that which controls the acts of man. He is thinking
essentially about whether man’s will is good or bad. This is what Pojman calls character, which
may be virtuous or villainous or neutral. (Pojman, 1995) Van Til would not agree that neutrality
is an option. For Pojman both character and motive may be neutral. Van Til would differ with
him. Kohn shares Pojman’s approach when he says that the evidence supports the idea that it is

just as natural for children to help as it is to hurt. (Kohn, 1991, 1997, 2003) Lewis agrees with
Van Til that that which is inside a man is what propels his outward behavior. “You cannot make
men good by law: and without good men you cannot have a good society. That is why we must
go on to think of the…morality inside the individual” (Lewis, 1952, p.73).
Kohn’s negation of the doctrine of original sin is not convincing. He says, “From St.
Augustine to the present,” this view has been preached by those “who see people as basically
sinful” (Kohn, 1997, 2003). Kohn relegates this “dim view of human nature,” to religious
dogma, not scientific fact (Kohn, 1997, 2003). Kohn refers to his review of several hundred
studies that have convinced him that this cynicism about human nature is not realism. (Kohn,
1991) Others disagree just as strongly, recognizing the impact of sin in all areas of human life
and culture. Tinder says, “The proposition that none are good does not mean merely that none
are perfect. It means that all are persistently and deeply inclined toward evil. All are sinful”
(Tinder, 1989, p. 76). He emphasizes this point, “Our predisposition toward such actions is so
powerful and so unyielding that it holds us captive” (Tinder, 1989, p. 77). As Kohn states,
Augustine and other ancients would affirm this view. Tinder shows he understands the
indignation Kohn and others with this comment, “Nothing in Christian doctrine so offends
people today as the stress on sin” (Tinder, 1989, p. 76).
Kohn might call on John Dewey and Bertrand Russell for support. Dewey uses the word
“sin” only as he appropriates certain “supernaturalist” ideas to promote his naturalist religion.
Dewey is a pragmatist in his use of religious language. He is willing to accept words such as
“God,” “divine,” “sin,” and “redemption” as they advance the purposes of his naturalist religion.
(Dewey, 1934, pp. 52-53) Otherwise, in his naturalistic universe there is only experience, that
which promotes further experiences is good, and that which hinders further experience is not.

This is how morality is defined, rather than as an offense against the divine. (Dewey, 1938, p. 37;
1934, p. 3) Russell agrees, “When you hear people in church debasing themselves and saying
that they are miserable sinners, and all the rest of it, it seems contemptible and not worthy of
self-respecting human beings. We ought to stand up and look the world frankly in the face”
(Russell, 1957, p. 9).
Van Til’s theory of the nature of man includes the concept of sin and the fall. “Just as sin
has blinded the intellect of man,” says Van Til, “so it has corrupted the will of man” (Van Til,
1977, p. 22; Van Til, 1955, p. 54). Van Til, a Calvinist, affirms the doctrine of the total depravity
of man. By total depravity a Calvinist would mean that there is no aspect of the human being that
is not affected by sin including the social, intellectual, ethical, physical, spiritual and social
aspects of humanity. Redemption is not limited to a person’s spirituality alone, but involves the
whole person.
Pojman speaks of ethical actions produced by virtuous persons. He believes that ethics
can be separated from religion, a position neither Lewis nor Van Til would concede. Van Til
might say of Pojman’s virtue ethics that outward virtuous actions do not necessarily proceed
from a virtuous heart. (Pojman, 1995) Lewis concurs, “Unless we go on to… the tidying up
inside each human being—we are only deceiving ourselves” (Lewis, 1952, p. 73). “There is a
difference between doing some particular just or temperate action and being a just or temperate
man” (Lewis, 1952, p. 79).
For Van Til, Christ was both priest and sacrifice on our behalf. He “offer[ed] himself a
sacrifice to satisfy divine justice, and reconcile us to God, and … mak [es] continual intercession
for us” (Van Til, 1955, p. 17). It is the work of Christ that changes the man and as Lewis says

makes him moral inside. It is Christ who makes a person virtuous, not on their own merit, but on
the merit of Christ alone by faith.
Standard of Behavior.
Additionally, we speak about the quality of a person’s action as determined by a standard
or criterion. What shall serve as the ethical standard? Pojman’s treatment of consequences is
placed along side Van Til’s search for a criterion and Lewis’s standard of fair play and harmony
standard. Pojman introduces us to teleological ethics when he discusses the consequences of a
person’s action as the standard for moral behavior. Mill (1863), a consequentialist or utilitarian
theorist, proposed a moral standard that he called “the Greatest Happiness Principle,” a theory of
utility that meant “pleasure itself, together with exemption from pain.” “Actions,” Mill said, “are
right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse
of happiness.” (Mill, 1863) “…The theory of life on which this theory of morality is grounded –
namely, that pleasure, and freedom from pain, are the only things desirable as ends…” (Mill,
1863).
However attractive this theory may seem, there are insurmountable weaknesses. Among
the most significant obstacles are that man is both finite and sinful. As finite beings we are not
capable of considering every option, nor can we consider the consequences of all those options.
We cannot see into the future to evaluate all the consequences of our choices. The number
possible choices and permutations of consequences are beyond imagination. Our finitude extends
to our lack of objectivity. The task of quantifying the consequences of ethical choices would be
too subjective and ultimately unworkable. Besides being finite, mankind is corrupt. Van Til says,
“Man’s moral consciousness then as it is today is (a) finite and (b) sinful. If it were only finite
and not sinful we could go to the moral consciousness of man for our information” (Van Til,

1955, p. 54). Being thus identified as a corrupt being, man is rendered an unreliable evaluator of
consequences.
Van Til (1955) extends the effect of the fall to the question of the source of ethical
standards:
This doctrine of total depravity of man makes it plain that the moral consciousness of
man as he is today cannot be the source for information about what is ideal good or about
what is the standard of the good or about what is the true nature of the will which is to
strive for the good. (p. 54)
Lewis’s (1952) suggestion that the standard should be “fair play and harmony between
individuals” (p. 72), seems much more concrete, down to earth, and attainable. Lewis worked out
his moral standard by describing seven virtues, four of which were cardinal, and three of which
were theological. The cardinal virtues consist of prudence, temperance, justice and fortitude. The
theological virtues consist of faith, hope and charity. (Lewis, 1952)
Van Til insists that, “the Christian position maintains that man, as a creature of God,
naturally would have to inquire of God what is right and wrong” (Van Til, 1977, p. 33). It is the
God of scripture who sets the standard through His revealed will. Christian-theistic “laws” may
include the Ten Commandments, Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, or even Lewis’s cardinal and
theological virtues. Van Til sees these as “principle summar[ies] of the expressed will of God to
man” (Van Til, 1977, p. 146). Christ sums up the law succinctly, “The most important
[commandment] is this… love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and
with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: Love your neighbor as
yourself” (Mark 12: 29-31).

An interesting question, though one not pursued in this paper, would be whether God’s
will as expressed in His Word, as the standard for moral actions, fulfills all of Pojman’s
characteristics of moral principles: prescriptivity, universalizability , overridingness, publicity,
and practicability. (Pojman, 1995, p. 7)
The End of Actions.
Finally, we will speak of the end or purpose of ethical deeds. While a teleological ethic is
concerned with the consequences of the action, ethical systems concerned with duty or “ends”
are called deontological. One duty-oriented system that has been proposed is simply the
obligation to obey God. Kant was familiar with this obligation through his Lutheran upbringing.
(Schneewind, 2002) Luther (1517/1957) had said:
God is he for whose will no cause or ground may be laid down as a rule or standard; for
nothing is on a level with it or above it… what God wills is not right because he ought or
was bound so to will; on the contrary, what takes place must be right, because he so wills.
(p. 209)
Kant sought to defend human dignity by guarding free will from such a tyrannical God.
Kant appropriated the concept of autonomy from its use in politics where it described
independent and sovereign states that were appropriately a law to themselves, and applied it to
the human will and morality. “Autonomy of the will is the property of the will through which it
is a law to itself” (Kant, 1785, p. 58). Lewis (1952) comments about autonomy when he says,
Does it not make a great difference whether I am, so to speak, the landlord of my own
mind and body, or only a tenant, responsible to the real landlord? If somebody else made
me, for his own purposes, then I shall have a lot of duties which I should not have if I
simply belonged to myself. (p. 74)

Van Til uses the phrase summum bonum, or the highest good, to express the end or
purpose of all human actions. For Van Til, the direction can be described as “Man…. Seek[ing]
God’s glory in every act that he does” (Van Til, 1977, p. 41). The Westminster Shorter
Catechism asks the question: What is the chief end of man? The answer is given: Man’s chief
end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. (Westminster Shorter Catechism, question 1)
Lewis’s concept has a sense of the human race collectively rather than individually, but
that need not conflict with Van Til’s end or purpose of man. Van Til says that God’s glory is
man’s highest good. He treated the summum bonum for the individual, and shows how this leads
to self-realization, righteousness and freedom. When Van Til considers the summum bonum for
society, we find that it leads to altruism, prosperity, happiness, utility, and good will. (Van Til,
1977)
4. Character Formation Makes Room for Ambiguity, Tension, and Paradox
Addressing another objection to character education programs, Kohn criticized the
method of instruction, one that Dewey described as “imposition from above and from outside”
(Dewey, 1938, p. 18). Kohn explained, “Character education nowadays is, for the most part, a
collection of exhortations and extrinsic inducements designed to make children work harder and
do what they’re told” (Kohn, 2003, p. 181). Further he explained, “They are manifestations of a
model that sees children as objects to be manipulated rather than as learners to be engaged.”
(Kohn, 2003, p. 187) Paulo Freire (1993) spoke of this as the “banking” method of education:
Education becomes an act of depositing, in which students are the depositories and the
teacher is the depositor…. The teacher… makes deposits which the students patiently
receive, memorize, and repeat. This is the banking concept of education, in which the

scope of action allowed to the students extends only as far as receiving, filing, and storing
the deposits. (p. 53)
The character education program must not be neatly packaged and delivered to students.
They need to wrestle with questions. There are many clear voices raised in concern about what
Parker Palmer calls “the objectivist theory of knowing.” (Palmer, 1983) Purpel called for
educators to put aside the “world of hierarchy, privilege, inequality, injustice, moral callousness,
personal gain and international competition” (Purpel, 1991a, p. 45). That is the world of brute
facts and objective knowledge that arises from the world that Palmer described. In this system of
education built on objectivist theory, “Students need to know more, work harder, be more
obedient, and above all, be tougher competitors” (Purpel, 1991a, p. 50). Purpel recognized the
insecurity that may be felt when the traditional, predictable system is shaken. He encouraged
Christian educators, “Your task is to create a seamless web among your educational practices,
social beliefs, and religious faith” (Purpel, 1991a, p. 59) Again, “The praxis is cyclical,
continuous and ever-changing” (Purpel, 1991a, p. 59). No more will the world be split between
the scientific and the spiritual, and no more will an objective world be carefully dissected, and
neatly compartmentalized. Those engaged in moral education and character building need to
recognize that “schools are not and cannot be neutral” (Purpel, 1991b, p. 3). Purpel challenges us
to “refuse to participate in the denial of the inevitability of moral bias” (Purpel, 1997, p. 260).
“Such issues are inherently of incredible complexity, and they are made even more
problematic by our particular historical and cultural tradition” (Purpel, 1991b, p. 1). “We have
come to appreciate… the complexity, fragility, and contingency of what has been presented as
facts, logic, truth, and certainty” (Purpel, 1997, p. 264).

Thus far in this section the traditional has been critiqued, and change has been
recommended. The alternative is to live in the real world with ambiguity, tension and paradox.
Read the experiences and follow the example of practitioners who are teaching students to think.
Here are a few examples: 1) Do some problem-posing with Paulo Freire (1993), 2) Ask questions
of the habits of the mind with Deborah Meier’s, 3) Practice the community of the truth, with the
subject at the center with Parker Palmer (1998), and 4) Exercise our analogical imagination
along with William C. Spohn (1999).

References
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