Idea of an Episcopal School

The Idea of an Episcopal School was created by the Oregon Episcopal School Religious Life Committee and adopted by the OES Board of Trustees in May, 1992. This document, in its entirety, was formally adopted in March, 1995 (with permission from OES) by the Board of Trustees for use by St. Mary's Episcopal School.

Episcopalians have always treasured their particular traditions.

Despite a strong and long-standing tradition of church schools in both the Anglican (or Church of England) and American Episcopal traditions, the identity of such schools and the nature of their relationship with the church continues to be defined. The variety of Episcopal schools which range from parochial day schools that are a direct outgrowth of church mission, to independent boarding schools with only the loosest connections to a diocese, almost defies attempts to define them. The diverse religious backgrounds and cultures of their student and faculty populations raise constant questions of how closely tied they can or should be to the church, and all Episcopal schools must struggle with the question of what it means to be "Episcopal." Particular issues may range from qualifications for board and head, to religious curriculum requirements, to participation in school worship.

What Episcopal schools, like other schools, strive for, teach, believe, emphasize and cultivate must always grow out of present needs and look forward to the demands of the future. But Episcopalians have always treasured their particular traditions, and it may be that the principles embodied in the history of the church in this country, and going back to its roots in England, might help clarify the mission of a school that calls itself Episcopal. The points that follow are an attempt to provide not an exhaustive system of such principles but the framework for a discussion and clarification. (We will use the terms "Episcopal" and "Anglican" more or less interchangeably, although properly, Anglican refers to any of the worldwide family of churches which are offshoots of the Church of England, while Episcopal refers specifically to the member of the family in the United States .)

An Episcopal school is comprehensive and inclusive.

One of the principles of Anglicanism since the first Queen Elizabeth imposed her own version of diversity on squabbling church factions is that there is considerable room inside the church for differences of practice and even differences of belief, so long as there is agreement on the fundamentals. In the Church of England today one finds as broad a range of beliefs and practices as one is likely to find in any national Christian church. Partly this comes from the fact that the English church is a national church, identified with the whole nation and the state and, therefore, expected to see the whole population as under its pastoral care. But even the American Episcopal Church has survived differences among its members that would have divided other denominations. (Even the contest over slavery that split most other Protestant denominations did not divide the Episcopal Church.) Our church encourages respect for the other person's beliefs. An Episcopal school may be expected not to discriminate on the basis of race, creed, etc., and but to actively seek out faculty and students of diverse backgrounds and traditions in the belief that they bring something to be valued and respected, and because we would like to be broadly inclusive of the community we serve. An Episcopal school will look for the va lues that unite people rather than those that divide and not allow factionalism to undermine the life of the whole.

An Episcopal school values individual freedom and diversity of belief, and authority is exercised loosely.

Anglicanism's Protestant roots are revealed in the extent to which the church is limited in its authority to impose beliefs and practices on individual members. This is only multiplied by the American church's birth and growth in the environment of democracy. While we have bishops who are symbols of the unity and traditions of the church, they are limited in their powers over local congregations and over individual believers. The clergy are likewise limited in their powers, and the lay people, especially in the American church, have considerable latitude and discretion in how they organize and carry out God's work at the local level. The idea of imposing beliefs on individuals, or of punishing them for heterodoxy, has been largely repugnant in the Anglican tradition, at least since the late seventeenth century, perhaps because of the horrors of a century of religious conflict in England that ended with the Glorious Revolution.

Church government in this country is essentially democratic at all levels, with the bishops' authority more moral and inspirational than legal or bureaucratic. This model suggests that authority in the Episcopal school might be exercised in the same way, with a respect for collegiality, with leadership by service rather than by fiat and with the recognition that the best and most effective leadership is inspirational. An Episcopal school will allow considerable latitude both to faculty and to students in their work, will encourage independent thought and action, and will foster participatory decision-making. It will also be guided by the ancient "councilor" principle that the "right way" is found in careful deliberation and consensus.

The unity of an Episcopal School is based on ritual and tradition rather than doctrine.

The late Dean Urban Holmes wrote of Episcopalians, "Whereas some communions have their official theologians and others have their confessions, we have the Book of Common Prayer. Our theology arises out of our common liturgy." In the Elizabethan settlement that established the Anglican church, the uniformity imposed was a uniformity of worship, not of doctrine. This is not to say that doctrine is not important, but in a church where wide latitude of belief is allowed, it is in worship that we are bound most closely together. It is through our worship that we have had the most influence on the society we live in, as witness the incorporation of Episcopal worship into other denominations and even into secular institutions. If you want to understand what it means to be an Episcopalian, you have to come worship with us.

In an Episcopal school, there will likely be no single dogma to which we all subscribe, no list of rules that define who we must be as a community. An Episcopal school ought to be able to point to its own rituals and its own traditions that embody the principles and practices of the school community. It will value deeply its own traditions without getting stuck in them, recognizing that these embody the common values of the school community. Its rituals may not all derive from the Book of Common Prayer, but every member of the community should be able to join in celebrating the life of the community in some ritual way (rituals can be both formal and informal). There is at work here, too, a sacred principle which we hold dear: that God makes sacred the things of this world as they are offered to God in worship. Students should have the opportunity to experience the best of Episcopal worship if they are to understand the heart of the church's teaching.

An Episcopal school values reason as a way to true understanding

Anglicanism has always put faith and revelation first, like most Protestants. But Anglican theologianshave suggested since the seventeenth century that human reason offers a tool to interpret divine scripture and to wrestle with the most spiritual issues. (Again, because there is no human authority to tell us how to think, the responsibility to reason our way to understanding becomes essentially a human enterprise, in good Protestant fashion, which in turn underlines the idea of respect for individual beliefs.) So in the Episcopal tradition learning is important, not just to find the right answers to be used as weapons against unbelievers, but in order to arrive at God's truth. This suggests that our understanding of truth is that "all truth is God's truth." James Russell Lowell wrote, " New occasions teach new duties. Time makes ancient good uncouth, they must upward still and onward who would keep abreast of truth." We believe that the truth will make us free and that God h as given us freedom to seek truth without fearing where it may lead. This suggests that our understanding of truth may grow and change, that God welcomes questions, and that we may subject all our ideas and beliefs to our critical faculties.

Clearly, then, an Episcopal education is not indoctrination, not about enforcing an unquestioning acceptance of a foreordained set of doctrines. An Episcopal education should begin from the premise that we (faculty, students, administrators, staff, parents) are all a community of explorers, that we all need to continue to learn and to grow. It should encourage all students, faculty, and staff to follow questions wherever they lead, to use their critical faculties, to value the learning and thought that we have inherited from the past. It should also, one would think, (and here we part company with secular education) refuse to allow students to separate religion and spirituality from the rest of the curriculum since the Anglican insight is that reason and learning are ultimately intended to serve our exploration of the deepest issues of humans. An Episcopal education will raise issues of meaning, identity, and ultimate truth at every opportunity in all parts of its program but will also acknowled ge the limits of human reason.

An Episcopal school has a concern for the well-being of society.

One of the basic divisions in Protestantism is between those churches which see the world as hopelessly corrupt and irredeemable and which therefore withdraw from the world, and those which see the hope of redeeming and transforming the world and are therefore involved in it. The Episcopal Church clearly falls in the latter category. Again, the tradition of the Church of England as a state church makes it without any question interested in the fate of society. The Episcopal Church began its life as an established church in this country and has had a hard time, some would argue, admitting it is not. The positive side of this is that despite its essentially conservative nature, the church has maintained a commitment to being involved in trying to shape society, a commitment that has been reinforced, especially by the Oxford and Anglo-Catholic reform movements and their interest in the impact of industrialization on society in the last two centuries. This belief that the church exists not to rescue people from society but to help transform society has been especially strong in this country since the 1960's, involving the church in efforts to help racial minorities and the poor, and to work for peace. So this work involves not just work for private charity but efforts to influence public policy, which suggests that an Episcopal school should make a concern for society part of its program.

The school will help students to understand that they do not exist apart from society, that society's issues are their issues.

The school will help students to understand that they do not exist apart from society, that society's issues are their issues, and that they are called to respond to the needs of others. Students will be encouraged not just to share what they have with others, but to understand the issues and complexities of society and to consider what their individual and corporate responsibilities are and to take action.

St. Mary's Episcopal School stands in the best tradition of independent and Episcopal education and was founded in 1847 by Mrs. Mary Pope as a college preparatory school for girls at Calvary Episcopal Church. On her retirement in the 1870's, Bishop Charles Quintard invited the sisters from the Order of St. Mary's in New York to take over operation of St. Mary's Episcopal School. Today the school is governed by a board of trustees which includes lay people and clergy. The Bishop of West Tennessee serves as an ex officio member of the board, as does the rector of the Church of the Holy Communion. St. Mary's is an institution of the Diocese of West Tennessee and holds membership in the National Association of Episcopal Schools, the National Association of Independent Schools, the College Board, Educational Records Bureau, School and Student Service for Financial Aid, National Association of Principals of Schools for Girls, Council for Religion in Independent Schools, Southern Association of Indepen dent Schools, Tennessee Association of Independent Schools, and Memphis Association of Independent Schools. St. Mary's is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. It serves a diverse population of girls in the Memphis and Shelby County area.

Episcopalians, like all Christians, believe that our life is founded on the life of Jesus Christ, and that as a church we are called to offer the redeeming love of Christ to all people. St. Mary's is a concrete expression of the church's care for young people and their families, and of the belief that God calls us to love all God's children, as Jesus offered his life for all humankind.