ABSTRACT
The nature of Christian upbringing needs to be redefined. There can no longer be an easy identification of Christian development with general education. An outline of the problem was offered in School Worship, an Obituary but in the discussions which lay behind The Child in the Church report it became clearer that Christian nurture must somehow include the idea of critical openness. In a changing world an unchanging theology becomes irrelevant. A theology which is baldly declared merely proclaimed or applied without pausing to listen and to examine itself presumes for itself an authority which will no longer be recognized. Christian nurture is offered by Christians to Christians in order to strengthen Christian faith and to develop Christian character. It is easily distinguished from general education, since the latter does not intend the building up of Christian faith, nor must the teachers of general education be Christian.
