This week, January 29 - February 4, 2023, we celebrate National Catholic Schools Week. It reminds us of the value and importance of Catholic education. We are blessed to have our own parish Kindergarten through 8th-grade school, our own early education center, and also to have several Catholic high schools in our area. I hope you see the great things that are going on in them!
Do you know the history of Catholic education in the United States? Education has always been part of Catholicism, and here are just a few highlights. Jesus taught! Maybe not reading, writing, and arithmetic, but Jesus taught his disciples about the most important things in life. There were no Catholic schools in the early Church—Christianity was illegal and persecuted in the Roman Empire—but education occurred. After the legalization of Christianity in 313 AD, soon followed the fall the Roman Empire (c. 474), and the “Dark Ages” where my ancestors, barbarian Germanic tribes, came to power. So much knowledge would have been lost if not for the Church which endured through it all. Monasteries preserved knowledge. They became centers of education. Thomas Woods in his book “How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization” said, “Among other things, the monks taught metallurgy, introduced new crops, coped ancient texts, preserved literacy, pioneered in technology, invented champagne, improved the European landscape, provided for wanderers of every stripe, and looked after the lost and shipwrecked.”
Out of this time, the Catholic universities emerged. Nothing like it had existed previously. They evolved over time, beginning as Cathedral schools where masters and students met. Universities took form definitively by the 12th century and featured required texts, professors, lectures, well-defined academic programs, and the granting of degrees.
Out of these centuries, great religious orders emerged—Franciscans, Dominicans, and later Jesuits—and so many religious became missionaries to new lands, such as the Americas. The first Catholic school in America could be considered as the education brought 400 years ago by Franciscan missionaries in their mission in St. Augustine, Florida. Similarly, St. Junipero Serra (1713-1784) was a Franciscan missionary to the area that would become California. He established many missions which among other things helped teach agriculture and the raising of domestic animals.
The 13 English colonies were largely Protestant dominated, and their schools strongly promoted Protestantism. Catholic immigrants found this unacceptable and experienced anti-Catholicism. The response was the rise of American saints and a Catholic parochial school system. The first Catholic seminary was founded in Baltimore in 1791. St. Elizabeth Ann Seton (1774-1821) was a convert to Catholicism and experienced anti-Catholicism in New York in trying to teach there. She was invited by the first United States Bishop, John Carroll, to open a girls school in Maryland in 1810. This was considered the first US Catholic elementary school. The efforts of St. Elizabeth and the religious order she founded laid the groundwork for our Catholic school system. St. John Neumann (1811-1860), an immigrant from Bohemia, became a priest and bishop and is credited with establishing the first Catholic diocesan school system. In his diocese of Philadelphia from 1852-1860 he increased the number of parochial schools from one to 200 in order to provide Catholic education for the many immigrants. St. Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini (1850-1917) as an Italian-American missionary sister who came to America to serve the Italian immigrants. She established schools, orphanages, and hospitals. St. Katharine Drexel (1858-1955) was a rich American heiress who gave up her fortune to establish and serve through education the poor in America. In particular she saw the injustice done to Native Americans and African Americans. Over her life she helped establish 145 missions, 50 schools for African Americans, and 12 schools for Native Americans.
These are just some of the highlights, but they show the spirit of Catholic Education as integral to our mission of bringing Christ to the world, of service, and of love. Behind these saints, millions of faithful lay and religious Catholics sacrificed to make Catholic schools happen. In 2021-2022 there were 1,688,417 Catholic school students in 5938 schools. These schools continue to educate students to succeed in life, to provide opportunities for those who otherwise might be disadvantaged, and to show that Jesus and faith are compatible and even essential in living a good life! I think our teachers, admin, parents, and supporting parishioners are modern day saints. You are sacrificing to provide faith and education to the next generation! Thank you and please pray for our Catholic schools.
Peace,
Fr. Greg