End of story? Pure nonsense. A year later I feel compelled to reply to this. A scientist in Europe had no choice what to believe in the mid 1900′s?! What? Even in the high mediaeval ages (when Italy, and all of Europe, was actually Catholic) people still had a choice as to whether the faith would be consequential in their lives. Nowadays, you can ask the millions of people who were raised in religious households but now no longer practice their faith if being in a religious environment (family, culture, country) is the “end of the story.”

“A concerned teacher” doesn’t even regard it as a possibility that Maria Montessori was a Catholic because she believed Catholicism (what with its loving God, freedom within limits, complete respect of life, and whole-world thinking) to be *gasp* true. And this concerns me.

Also it occurs to me that if Maria spent her life as she did, worshiping Christ and praising the Church, but instead of teaching children she imprisoned them, you probably wouldn’t let her Catholicism off the hook so easily. It’s the same “heads I win, tails you lose” move non-believers have been employing unfairly for countless years: if a Catholic does something good, it isn’t because he or she is Catholic but for some other reason (she’s an Italian scientist in this case) but if a Catholic does something bad… then see how a belief in God is to blame, or how faith is outdated, or the Church is evil.

Another friend explained it to me thus: a teacher can show you concepts, but it’s for to you to actually “get it”. So there’s nothing wrong w/ the showing part. I liked her explanation and it makes sense to me.