The Diocese of Charlotte school system, including Asheville Catholic School, focuses on how best to weave our faith throughout the curriculum so that students understand how they are connected, and establishing a context for other things they learn. In common conversation, we often ask how we can ensure the "Catholicity" of our schools remains strong and continues to grow.
A natural inclination is to look back through the history of the Church and identify the monumental impact the Catholic Church has had on education. We might recall Gregor Mendel, the Augustinian monk, called "the father of genetics" because of his discoveries while conducting genetic experiments with pea plants. Or, we might remember St. Augustine and his profound teachings as a Doctor of the Church. As an isolated approach, teaching students about these historical figures, while very important, makes it difficult for our students to see the relevancy, meaning and connection that our faith has to what they are learning each day in school. We must also show our students how they fit into the contemporary world with all of its challenges.
In understanding that all knowledge comes from God, we must not neglect to teach our students that the wisdom of how to use that knowledge also comes from God. Choose any admired thinker from any era, and you'll find someone whose knowledge and wisdom came from God. As educators, we must impress upon our students the enormous opportunity they have to make choices about how they might change the world with what they have learned in the classroom – in other words, how to use wisdom, a gift of the Holy Spirit, to guide their free will so they may fulfill God's mission for them.
This is where our focus should be when it comes to the "Catholicity" of our schools. What are we teaching our students to do with the knowledge gained in our classrooms? What problems are we facing that our students could grow up to solve because of what they learned from a Catholic education?
Pope Francis made the following statement about the struggles our schools face when it comes to instilling a Catholic worldview and finding solutions to the world's problems: "Again and again, the Church has acted as a mediator in finding solutions to problems affecting peace, social harmony, the land, the defense of life, human and civil rights, and so forth. And how much good has been done by Catholic schools and universities around the world! This is a good thing. Yet, we find it difficult to make people see that when we raise other questions less palatable to public opinion, we are doing so out of fidelity to precisely the same convictions about human dignity and the common good."
In his statement, not only does the Holy Father identify the major areas where we continue to see global concerns, but he does so while acknowledging the challenges of current public opinions.
At Asheville Catholic School, students experience a high level of academic challenge, while they also learn the virtues and other guiding principles needed to weather the storms of public opinion. Seeing to such a task must be intentional, or the prevailing winds that buffet our students while they navigate the narrow straits of today's culture will blow them off course. For example, at Asheville Catholic School, we have developed a model for global leadership that relies heavily on making the theological and cardinal virtues ubiquitous in the school culture. We combine these seven virtues with Stephen Covey's "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" to build a values system to serve students well when combined with the academic knowledge they gain. The principles found in the virtues are timeless and applicable to any situation – enormously important in today's society. If we have a student who combines a commitment to living out the virtues of our faith along with strong academic knowledge, even in the challenging culture of today, then we have someone who is well prepared to take on the problems of our world.
In 2014, Pope Francis identified three areas of focus for Catholic education: the value of dialogue, the qualified preparation of educators, and the responsibility of educational institutions to express the living presence of the Gospel in the fields of education, science and culture.
On his first point, he compared the task at hand for Catholic schools to that of Christ Himself when He proclaimed the Good News in a region that was a crossroads of people, culture and religion. The Holy Father acknowledges the profound changes that have led to an "ever wider diffusion of multicultural societies." This educational environment requires dialogue, as Pope Francis says, "...with courageous and innovative fidelity that enables Catholic identity to encounter the various 'souls' of multicultural society."
Addressing the preparation of Catholic educators, he went on to emphasize that the current educational environment is "guided by a changing generation," and that even the Church as a whole (as an educating mother) "is required to change, in the sense of knowing how to communicate with the young."
On his third point, Pope Francis reiterated that Catholic academic institutions should avoid "isolating themselves in the world." Instead, he said, Catholic schools should "know how to enter, with courage, into the Areopagus of contemporary cultures and to initiate dialogue, aware of the gift they are able to offer to all."
So, as we consider the value of a Catholic education in celebration of Catholic Schools Week, let us consider "Catholicity" not solely by looking back at history, but as an integral part of charting a path forward for our students so that they can make history – relying on Christ to guide them in solving the problems of our world.
Michael Miller is the principal of Asheville Catholic School.
What we think is the right road
The poet Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, "Whosoever would be a man, must be a nonconformist." Today, we would add "...or woman" to Emerson's advice, while still mostly agreeing that, of course, everyone should be left to his or her own devices. After all, my body (and mind) are my own to do with as I please, when I please. Except for popular legislation, nothing can tell me what to do or how to act. I am the judge of myself.
But it's the wrong road
Among the mistakes made by many well-intended Christian apologists is the proposition that if we can cite the "right" Biblical chapter and verse, its persuasive power will convert any reader or listener, for God's word is – truly – "sharper than any double-edged sword" (Heb 4:12). The problem, though, is that if one doubts the divine validity of that Scriptural passage, then its value will be thwarted – at least in the mind of the doubter.
So we who seek to convert the doubters are mistaken in merely quoting the Bible. Still, the Bible is constantly corroborated by what has transpired in history – and in our own lives. For example, so often we or our leaders think that we have the answers to various enduring problems, only to discover that we were mistaken or gullible (see Ps 81:11-12).
In 2 Chronicles, the Israelites pray to God: "We do not know what to do, but we look to you for help" (20:12). That conviction is amplified in the New Testament, which teaches that "there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism; there is one God and Father of all mankind, who is Lord of all, works through all, and is in all" (Eph 4:5-6 GNB). Our ultimate goal is not independence, or autonomy, or "doing it my way." Our ultimate goal is union with Christ, in and through His Church.
Other paths lead to chaos and corruption.
Emerson was terribly wrong about our having to be nonconformists. Quite the reverse: we must be conformists. "Do not model yourselves on the behavior of the world around you, but let your behavior change, modeled by your new mind" (Romans 12:2 JB). The "new mind," of course, is that of Christ (1 Cor 2:16), to which we must conform, to which we must "configure" ourselves. Such moral conformity, configuring or modeling is accomplished by and through the grace of God, with which we cooperate (see Catechism of the Catholic Church 1460, 1505 and 1847).
The logic is this: God exists and has given us His divine Son, who, in turn, has given us the Church as Mother and Teacher. We are fulfilled by conforming our lives to that divine teaching. The poet Dante Alighieri, whom Pope Francis wishes us to read this coming year, captures this with his words: "In His will is our peace." When we configure ourselves and our societies to His will, we have peace. And happiness. And meaning. When we dismiss, distort or deny that teaching, we have misery and a culture of death.
In short, if you want happiness, follow Christ. Conform to His way and to His will.
Is any of this, though, susceptible to empirical testing? That is, can we prove it by factual evidence? I think so. A Pharisee named Gamaliel once said this about the new Christian Apostles: "If what they have planned and done is of human origin, it will disappear, but if it comes from God, you cannot possibly defeat them" (Acts 5:38). Which institution existing today will be here – if the world endures – 1,000 years from now? Which institution existing today has taught, is teaching, and will teach an unchanging core of truth addressed to the nature and destiny of all human beings ever to walk the earth?
In Chapter 14 of Hebrews appear three sentences which flesh out the bones of this short argument. First, we have no permanent city here (v. 14), but we look always for our ultimate destiny, which, please God, lies with Him in Heaven. Second, Jesus Christ is "the same yesterday, today, and forever" (v. 8). Jesus is not a truth, or some truth, or temporary truth; Jesus is the full truth, now and always. Third, "Do not let all kinds of strange teachings lead you from the right way" (v. 9).
The chief "strange teaching" is that we should conform to nothing and to no one, except to our own prideful selves. That way lies moral disaster, not moral destiny.
We humans want to follow the right path and the true leader. That path and that leader shine in (and above) the pages of history and, if we have the eyes to see, in the events of our own lives. It is to Him that we should conform.
Deacon James H. Toner serves at Our Lady of Grace Church in Greensboro.