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March 30, 2016

Catholic Schools

By Sister Ellen Rose Coughlin, SSJ
Superintendent of Schools

Sometimes it is a challenge to live in the present moment! Although graduation and the end of the school year are weeks away, the attention of our principals is drawn not only to the end of this school year but also to the more distant future, the beginning of the next school year!

This focus on the next school year is particularly apparent in March when principals have their own form of March Madness as they host kindergarten registrations, school visits for potential new students and parent information opportunities.

Yesterday, I received a new book in the mail, Dear Pope Francis: The Pope Answers Letters from Children around the World (Loyola Press).  Children have questions and struggles just like adults. In Dear Pope Francis, our Holy Father gives children the chance to voice their concerns and ask the questions that rest deep in their hearts. Some of the question are fun; some serious; many are deep with meaning.

Pope Francis answers each question with sensitivity and clarity, teaching the children about Christ and our Catholic faith.

Some of the questions children asked Pope Francis include:
I would like to know more about Jesus Christ. How did he walk on water?
Our deceased relatives, can they see us from heaven?
What did God do before the world was made?
Where is your favorite place to pray and why?
Will my grandpa, a non-Catholic who is not a person willing to do something evil, go to heaven when he dies? In other words, if someone never makes any penances, how big a sin must he commit for him to go down to Hell?

This focus on the next school year is particularly apparent in March when principals have their own form of March Madness as they host kindergarten registrations, school visits for potential new students and parent information opportunities

How can God hear us?
My mum is in heaven. Will she grow angel wings?
Why are lots of people so poor and have no food? Can God give the poor people some food like He fed the 5,000 people?
Why do we venerate the cross?
Will the world be again as it was in the past?
How can you settle conflicts in the world?

Our Catholic schools have outstanding academic programs, safe and orderly environments that support learning and competent, dedicated administrators, faculty and staff. However, these are not the defining marks of a Catholic school.

Catholic schools are defined by what makes them unique.  First and Catholic Schoolsforemost they are places to meet Jesus and experience His transforming love and truth.

What makes our schools unique is not a program, or an environment or competent administrators and faculty. What makes them unique is a person, Jesus Christ.

In our schools, the deepest questions about the human person, about life and death, sin and eternal life, the transformation of society, relationship with others, personal responsibility – many of which the children asked Pope Francis – are answered with a Catholic world view that is founded on the Gospel and the rich heritage of our faith.  

If your children are not in a Catholic school and you live in an area where a Catholic school education is available I encourage you to contact the principal to arrange for a visit to the school.

Nothing can replace the personal experience provided by a school visit in which you can speak with the principal, tour the school and experience the atmosphere of the school community. A school visit, as well as talking to parents who send their children to a Catholic school, can be particularly helpful to parents who are preparing to send their first child to school.

If you currently have your children enrolled in one of our schools invite a neighbor or friend whose school aged children are not in a Catholic school to make a visit to the school with you. Imagine how the enrollment in a school would grow if every family currently enrolled convinced one other family that sending their children to the Catholic school would be a priceless investment in their child’s future.

 

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