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A
reflection on Catholic Schools Week
PRAISED BE JESUS
CHRIST!
(Now and Forever)
Catholic Schools Week is a special moment for parishes with schools as
well as for our two Catholic high schools. Superficially, it may appear
to be little more than an opportunity to show appreciation to our
teachers, the support staffs so important to our schools, and school
benefactors, but Catholic Schools Week is much more. It is a recognition
that Catholic schools are an important part of the mission of the
Church. The
Declaration on Christian Education issued by the Fathers of the Second
Vatican Council back in 1965 taught that parents are the primary
educators of their children. To quote the Council Fathers: “It is …
above all in the Christian family, inspired by the grace and the
responsibility of the sacrament of matrimony, that children should be
taught to know and worship God and to love their neighbor, in accordance
with the faith which they have received in earliest infancy in the
sacrament of baptism.”
Parents, of course, need help in fulfilling this role, especially if
they themselves are weak in their own understanding of Catholicism. The
Church is dedicated to providing assistance. Every parish offers
religious formation for its youth. Many factors contribute to the
effectiveness of those programs or lack thereof. It is not a perfect
world. Nonetheless, through catechist certification and our Ecclesial
Lay Ministry program, the quality of those efforts is improving. Then,
there are our Catholic schools. As a generalization they are the most
effective model of holistic formation available to parents.
Catholic schools provide a unique environment not otherwise available:
time, expertise and the Catholic world view.
Teaching and learning take time. Even when parents are diligent about
praying at home, going to Mass, taking their children to parish
religious education classes, and talking to their children about
Catholic values, holistic formation requires much more. It requires time
to teach children the essentials of our faith. Catholic schools devote
between five and seven hours a week to that effort. In addition, the
Catholic school is able to integrate religious values into secular
studies, be that history, literature, science, whatever. In every
Catholic school worthy of that name, faith is there to inform a
child’s understanding of relationships with their peers, adults, their
neighbors and the world. At age appropriate levels, children learn that
we do not belong to Caesar. We belong to God. Both in its religion
curriculum and throughout the school day, the Catholic school commits
time to teaching Catholic values, time that is not available in parish
religious education programs nor to most parents and which is verboten
in government schools.
The most important contribution of Catholic schools, however, is
providing students with a Catholic world view.
In a 2005 speech at Catholic University, Archbishop J. Michael Miller,
CSB, Secretary to the Vatican’s Congregation for Catholic Education,
highlighted this world view and an understanding of the human person as
essential marks of what makes a school Catholic. Archbishop Miller
emphasized the importance of the Catholic world view in these words:
“Because of the Gospel’s vital and guiding goal in a Catholic school, we
might be tempted to think that the identity and distinctiveness of
Catholic education lies in the quality of its religious instruction,
catechesis and pastoral activities. Nothing is further from the position
of the Holy See. Rather, the Catholic school is Catholic even apart from
such programs and projects. It is Catholic because it provides an
education in the intellectual and moral virtues, because it prepares for
a fully human life at the service of others, and for the life of the
world to come.”
Catholic schools exist to teach a particular “take” on reality, a take
that is even more crucial in our ever-increasingly secularized society
than in past times when Judeo-Christian values were taken for granted.
The Vatican Document on Catholic Schools states: “The Church establishes
schools because they are a privileged means of promoting the formation
of the whole person since the school is the center in which a specific
aspect of the world, of man and of history is developed and conveyed.”
The Catholic world view distinguishes Catholic schools from others and
is where parents most need the assistance of the Church.
Parents are not the only ones who benefit from Catholic schools,
however. All members of the Church, as well as broader society, benefit
when young people receive an education rooted in moral values.
Consider that in little more than a decade, today’s high school students
will be serving as leaders in our society. Our future doctors,
politicians, scientists, teachers, CEOs, business owners, Supreme Court
justices, women religious, priests and parents are today’s young people.
How well will the leaders of tomorrow be able to build a more ethical
and just world? If their faith is to inform their decisions in whatever
sphere of influence they find themselves, they need to have a strong
foundation in both Catholic teaching and the understanding of a Catholic
view of life. Historically, with all the challenges they have faced and
all the mistakes of the ’70s and ’80s, Catholic schools have been the
most effective means of forming young people in this value-based view of
our world.
All receive benefits from Catholic schools and their effort to form
future leaders who understand the importance of respect for life from
conception to natural death, the definition of family, the purpose and
beauty of human sexuality and the importance of social justice and who
look at issues critically with an ability to cut through relativism to
the essence of what is morally right and wrong.
It was the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884) that mandated
parochial schools. While not every parish in the United States was able
to establish a school, those that did made a tremendous contribution.
Unfortunately, Catholic schools fell on hard times in the latter part of
the 20th century. Sixty-six percent of our parishes do not have a
school. Some never have had a school. Others have seen schools close.
And, we have just two high schools. Still, Catholic schools are the best
of the rest when it comes to holistic formation of Catholics. It’s a
question of time, expertise and the commitment to educating students in
the Catholic world view.
This is what the diocese celebrates during Catholic Schools Week.
Whether there is a Catholic school in your area or not, I ask your
prayers for our schools and their success. Our teachers, administrators,
parents and students need God’s grace.
If you are a parent or grandparent of school-age children and a Catholic
school is available, consider the benefits found in Catholic schools
that a government school cannot offer. I ask you also to consider how
you might support this important mission of the Church. Catholic
schools, especially Catholic high schools, are expensive. Yet, Catholic
education is an investment in our future. |
