By Archbishop Thomas Wenski - The Archdiocese of Miami
Photographer: ANA RODRIGUEZ-SOTO | FC
Archbishop Thomas Wenski poses with Msgr. Vincent Kelly after the Mass with school principals in honor of Msgr. Kelly's 35 years of work in the Office of Faith Formation. He is retiring from his role at the archdiocesan level, but will continue to serve as supervising principal of St. Thomas Aquinas and Cardinal Gibbons high schools in Fort Lauderdale, as well as pastor of St. John the Baptist Parish.
In the responsorial psalm, we all sang: �How great are the works of the Lord.� One of those works, the one that you oversee as principals here in the Archdiocese of Miami, is the education of our youth. Most of our parishes are involved in an ever-growing number of ministries � whenever I visit a parish I look for a copy of the parish bulletin because more often than not the bulletin lists these ministries � and some of them are quite amazing. But the most amazing ministry � and perhaps the one that requires the most resources but at the same time is still one of the most effective in evangelizing families in our parishes � is the parish school. I think it bears repeating, as principals you are running more than just a private school; you are in charge of a ministry, a life-shaping and a life-changing ministry.
Catholic schools developed in our country at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, at a time when most Catholics in the United States were poor immigrants in a dominantly Protestant country that viewed these newcomers with more than a little suspicion. The bishops mandated that every parish have its school. One reason was to assure a proper education for the children of these Italian, Polish or Irish newcomers (for like African-American children in some of our public schools today, these children of immigrant Catholics were also victims �of the soft bigotry of low expectations� in the public schools of yesterday.)
Another equally compelling, if not more compelling reason, was to assure that these children would be socialized into a �Catholic ethos� � since back then public schools in America were essentially Protestant schools.
Much has changed in the last 100 years. Gone are the armies of nuns to staff these schools. Today, what could be considered the �Eighth� Sorrow of the Blessed Mother, there are only half as many Catholic schools in the U.S. as there were in 1960.
Tuition even back then required no little sacrifice for many parents � but tuition was relatively low, possibly because we had those nuns who worked almost for free and had no problem teaching a class of 50 or more kids.
Today, our parents � even some of our immigrant parents � are much more affluent. Classroom size is, thankfully, smaller. But some things haven�t changed: We still educate the poor. While a narrow but unnecessary understanding of the �separation of church and state� still unfairly discriminates against faith-based schools, access to corporate scholarships helps us to make a Catholic education available to a limited number poor kids; and parents still sacrifice, and parishes still subsidize when their resources allow.
Public schools are no longer Protestant � but they are secularist, and therefore teach a reductive world view hostile to faith. So Catholic schools still play a crucial role in communicating to our young people a Catholic ethos or worldview that is available no place else.
Whether we�re talking about 1911 or 2011, Catholic education is about giving our students the means to make a good living, to do well; and it is also about helping them learn the ways of being good and living well.
Our schools should always be about excellence. We want these kids to be the best version of themselves possible � which is perhaps another way of saying that we want them to realize the fundamental vocation of their baptism: We want them to be saints.
Catholic education, because it is based on the whole truth about the human person � our dignity and our destiny in the world (and beyond) � helps to open the hearts of our young people wider and it helps to broaden the horizons of their minds so that there might be room for the Infinite, room for God. As I said, you principals � in collaboration with your pastors � are in charge of more than just a school; you are in charge of a ministry, a life-shaping, life-changing ministry. �How great are the works of the Lord!�
We are surrounded by a hedonistic, materialistic society that is increasingly secularized, that is, it is organized without reference to God. We teach truth � with a capital �T� � not a truth we construct or invent; rather, a Truth not determined by our own wills but one that we receive � and, if we accept to receive it, a Truth that frees us from the individualism and egoism that so characterizes our post modern world.
Jesus was and is still a �sign of contradiction� and the cause of the �fall and rise of many.� The Lord already warned us: �If the world hates you, know that it has hated me first.� Today�s memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows reminds us that, like Mary, we too in our own lives must �make up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ for the sake of his body, which is the Church" (Colossians 1:24). But, nevertheless, God loves the world; and we must too.
For this reason, Catholic education must lead to witness � even though we cannot expect our witness to be without its tensions, its �dolores�. Our schools teach �religion� � which is more than just a subject found in our curriculum that is not found in the charter school down the road. �Religion� should pervade all that we do � for a Catholic religious education, which is a formation in Christian values but also in Christian virtue, presents a worldview in which God matters - and because God matters, so does the work of his hands, especially that work made in his own image and likeness, the human person.
Yes, God demands that we not be of the world. Nevertheless, he does not take us out of the world. He leaves us in the world precisely so that we might be for the world. (Even those who respond to a vocation to the cloistered life and in doing so leave the world, they never become �against� the world for this. Their mission � lived out in prayer and contemplation � is always a mission for the world. Jesus� disciples are always to be for the world.)
�How great are the works of the Lord!� I thank you for embracing this work, this ministry of family evangelization. The sacrifice of parents and our parishes to support Catholic education will be well worth the price if our young people�s existence is no longer �self� centered but rather directed towards others. This is fundamentally what Catholic education seeks to accomplish: to prepare our youth to be saints for the world: by putting into practice � with ever wider hearts and broadened minds � what they know of the love of God so that the world will come to believe in Jesus Christ and the one who sent him. After all, as Pope Benedict said, in speaking of our mission as Catholics in the world: If we don�t give them God, we give them too little.
Much has changed in the last 100 years. Gone are the armies of nuns to staff these schools. Today, what could be considered the �Eighth� Sorrow of the Blessed Mother, there are only half as many Catholic schools in the U.S. as there were in 1960.
Tuition even back then required no little sacrifice for many parents � but tuition was relatively low, possibly because we had those nuns who worked almost for free and had no problem teaching a class of 50 or more kids.
Today, our parents � even some of our immigrant parents � are much more affluent. Classroom size is, thankfully, smaller. But some things haven�t changed: We still educate the poor. While a narrow but unnecessary understanding of the �separation of church and state� still unfairly discriminates against faith-based schools, access to corporate scholarships helps us to make a Catholic education available to a limited number poor kids; and parents still sacrifice, and parishes still subsidize when their resources allow.
Public schools are no longer Protestant � but they are secularist, and therefore teach a reductive world view hostile to faith. So Catholic schools still play a crucial role in communicating to our young people a Catholic ethos or worldview that is available no place else.
Whether we�re talking about 1911 or 2011, Catholic education is about giving our students the means to make a good living, to do well; and it is also about helping them learn the ways of being good and living well.
Our schools should always be about excellence. We want these kids to be the best version of themselves possible � which is perhaps another way of saying that we want them to realize the fundamental vocation of their baptism: We want them to be saints.
Catholic education, because it is based on the whole truth about the human person � our dignity and our destiny in the world (and beyond) � helps to open the hearts of our young people wider and it helps to broaden the horizons of their minds so that there might be room for the Infinite, room for God. As I said, you principals � in collaboration with your pastors � are in charge of more than just a school; you are in charge of a ministry, a life-shaping, life-changing ministry. �How great are the works of the Lord!�
We are surrounded by a hedonistic, materialistic society that is increasingly secularized, that is, it is organized without reference to God. We teach truth � with a capital �T� � not a truth we construct or invent; rather, a Truth not determined by our own wills but one that we receive � and, if we accept to receive it, a Truth that frees us from the individualism and egoism that so characterizes our post modern world.
Jesus was and is still a �sign of contradiction� and the cause of the �fall and rise of many.� The Lord already warned us: �If the world hates you, know that it has hated me first.� Today�s memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows reminds us that, like Mary, we too in our own lives must �make up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ for the sake of his body, which is the Church" (Colossians 1:24). But, nevertheless, God loves the world; and we must too.
For this reason, Catholic education must lead to witness � even though we cannot expect our witness to be without its tensions, its �dolores�. Our schools teach �religion� � which is more than just a subject found in our curriculum that is not found in the charter school down the road. �Religion� should pervade all that we do � for a Catholic religious education, which is a formation in Christian values but also in Christian virtue, presents a worldview in which God matters - and because God matters, so does the work of his hands, especially that work made in his own image and likeness, the human person.
Yes, God demands that we not be of the world. Nevertheless, he does not take us out of the world. He leaves us in the world precisely so that we might be for the world. (Even those who respond to a vocation to the cloistered life and in doing so leave the world, they never become �against� the world for this. Their mission � lived out in prayer and contemplation � is always a mission for the world. Jesus� disciples are always to be for the world.)
�How great are the works of the Lord!� I thank you for embracing this work, this ministry of family evangelization. The sacrifice of parents and our parishes to support Catholic education will be well worth the price if our young people�s existence is no longer �self� centered but rather directed towards others. This is fundamentally what Catholic education seeks to accomplish: to prepare our youth to be saints for the world: by putting into practice � with ever wider hearts and broadened minds � what they know of the love of God so that the world will come to believe in Jesus Christ and the one who sent him. After all, as Pope Benedict said, in speaking of our mission as Catholics in the world: If we don�t give them God, we give them too little.
Comments from readers
It was a pleasure and an extraordinary experience working with you for so many years. You love the mission of the Church and the schools, you have lived your whole ministry to empower us in our school, you have been a true leader and especially a man of God.
May He continue to bless you,
Carlota E. Morales, Ed. D.
Principal
Sts. Peter and Paul School