Over the last few months, we have talked extensively about the process by which the Archdiocese will shut down schools. I was going through a copy of the Catholic Standard and came across an interesting comment -- something that I have been saying all along.
So, for those of you from the Archdiocese who read this (and I know you do), this is for you as you prepare to shut down more schools:
Msgr. Kane told a reporter on the day when St. Patrick's opened: "(Catholic) schools are the best instrument we've had in building the Church in this country."
Taken from the Catholic Standard, May 28, 2009, page 17.
8 comments:
That may have been true 40 years ago, but it hasn't been true in recent decades. Most Catholic schools are Catholic-in-name-only: barely passing on the Faith and doing little to keep Catholics in the Church. The recent Pew Study showed that religious education had little impact on keeping someone Catholic.
Until there is a radical renewal of truly Catholic education, I see little reason to support the schools. For example, can you name me a high school in the Archdiocese other than the Heights which really takes seriously the mission to form children in their Catholic Faith? Most simply tell the kids they need to be nice and help the poor. Very little is said about living a sacramental life and the importance of not being conformed to this world.
I'm sorry, but I would recommend that most Catholic parents either home-school if they can or send their kids to other private schools or even public schools and teach their children the Faith at home.
Avalon (boys) and Brookwood (girls) come to mind.
I forgot about Avalon and Brookwood - they are so new that I don't think of them as high schools yet. But they are good schools.
But no diocesan school comes to mind, does it?
I think Msgr. Kane is correct. The poster above who maligns the parish school is painting with too broad a brush. I will be forever thankful for my parish school principal whose words and leadership said, "Jesus is the reason for this school." I have also homeschooled and sent children to private Catholic schools. None were perfect. All, in some way, brought my children and my husband and me closer to Christ. A fact often left unmentioned is how many adults who have left the church during the college years and through the twenties, are lured back as their children receive the sacraments.
Ironic that with all of the archdiocese's resources(former/closed school buildings), Avalon meets at a Baptist church and, for years, met in a Montgomery County public school building.
To Anonymous 12:51 PM:
I am not "maligning" diocesan schools, I am simply pointing out indisputable - and statistically supportable - facts: they have not done a good job in passing on our Catholic Faith.
I do not deny that there are individual cases in which a parish school had faculty who were fine examples of the Faith to young people - such as what happened to you. However, on a macro level, there is plentiful evidence that the diocesan schools have failed, miserably, to pass on the Catholic Faith.
I wish this were not true, and I pray fervently that it might change, but we cannot reform the schools until we recognize that they are fundamentally unsound.
I went to Catholic schools for the first twele years of my schooling, and never once did anyone explain what the Immaculate Conception was. Basic catechism was never taught. Advanced catechism was also avoided as if it were the plague.
From personal experience, Catholic grade school was a sick joke. Catholic high school was a sicker joke, and we ever so coincidentally had for a headmaster a molester priest who made the news numerous time. Despite this, Catholic college was the sickest joke of them all.
After the Edit of Milan, the church became the Inclusive Church. After the fall of Rome, it became the Rural Church. After Ireland saved Europe from dark mindedness, the church became the Scholastic Church. After Robert Bellarmine, it became the Tridentine Church. Today, it has became the Sodomized Catholic Church. We can thank our bishops and religious education teachers for this.
I would not contribute 1 red cent to Catholic schools in this diocese... as an adoptive parent of a special needs child from St Ann's maternity Home in Hyattsville, I hoped my son would have a Catholic education, after 3 years at our parish school, he was too much trouble for the principal. ( he is of average intelligence but severely ADD/H) I called the Archdiocese, to find where he could obtain a Catholic education here. Was told to tell the principal that Catholic education is inclusive. (Me not the Archdiocese's office tell the principal!) Fortunately, DC Public Schools did not think the same way about their responsibility. But he did not receive the Catholic education so necessary for faith formation.
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