When parents bring children into the world, they take on the joyous and enormous responsibility to do their best by those children, to help them to attain their potential as human beings. Part of child-rearing is making sure that their children achieve a good education. To that end, most parents send them out to school, which function in loco parentis, in the place of a parent.
In sending them out, what do the parents expect of the schools to do in their place? To develop their children? To stretch them? To mold them into more than they would otherwise be?
This brings us to Middle Township Schools’ selection of “Pippin” as a high school play. In the actual production of any play, students are stretched, learning a great deal on many fronts. They also, however, take in much in the message contained within the play. If edifying, students are challenged to be more than they otherwise would be. On the other hand, if the messaging fires up their hormones, not only is an opportunity missed to stretch them, but also they have missed an opportunity to see in their superiors / their role models, a template demonstrating a more insightful, more developed approach to live this life than they would have following their own physical drives. They would have been reinforced in following their physical desires.
It is instructive that the controversy at Middle Township High School took place the same week that the renowned baseball player, Darryl Strawberry, was just down the road in Middle Township, speaking to a group of 500 men about what life has taught him on how to live this life and how not. He grew up in a dysfunctional family, and despite the fact that he was a highly successful baseball player, his personal life was in shambles.
During his formative years, he did not learn to avoid the youthful pitfalls, including right relationships with young ladies. Had he played the lead role in “Pippin,” where young ladies allured him, it would have reinforced the destructive behavior which oppressed him much of his life, bringing him enormous pain. As he explained it, his multi-million dollar contracts meant nothing in the face of the pain his actions brought to his wife, his family, and to his own inner peace.
High school plays should be an opportunity to display hard work and accomplishment to one’s family, including, may I add, to younger brothers and sisters. Yes, it is true; one must go through the travails of life in order to sift out what builds character and what undermines it. There are, however, many venues where such themes can be explored, and a high school play is not the appropriate one.
Art Hall
From the Bible: Teach a child to choose the right path, and when he is older, he will remain upon it. Proverbs 22:6
