"... you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”Some old-time religion, Catholic style, broke out at a recent school mass at Incarnation School in Palos Heights, IL. From the Palos Patch:
--- Acts of the Apostles, 1:8, part of the First Reading for the Solemnity of the Ascension
PALOS HEIGHTS, IL -- Parents at a south suburban Catholic elementary school that is slated to close permanently in June are enraged over remarks made by a monsignor to students during mass, which they claim were verbally abusive and bullying ... The Incarnation parents say their children will all have to start at new schools in the fall and already feel bad enough without being berated publicly by a church authority figure.
How, you may ask, did the good Monsignor fill these young Catholics with the joy of the Resurrection during this Easter season?
Sauraskas asked how many eighth graders went to Sunday mass, and a few of the kids raised their hands. Then he asked how many of the students' parents attended Sunday mass. The monsignor reportedly blustered when only a few students raised their hands. Incarnation is not within walking distance for many of the students, who depend on their parents for rides to school and church.
"He called us lousy Catholics," Tori said. "At first I thought it was a joke but when he started going on about it, I knew he wasn't joking and this is actually serious. He said he was glad the school was closing because we don't go to mass anyway and we were disappointing other parishioners who paid for our school."
Not to worry, though: there were also some adult parishioners at this daily mass, and they knew which side to pick:
Some of the older parishioners in the church who supported Sauraskas' views were also said to have started yelling at the kids. A teacher escorting her students out of mass ran back into the church in tears, stating the monsignor and other parishioners were yelling at her and the students.
Lest you fear that the good Monsignor was only verbally abusive, let me assure you that he found more creative ways to wax sarcastic:
Sauraskas is also alleged to have pretended to play a violin and make crying motions
The school did its best to handle the situation:
The children were so distraught that a crisis intervention session was conducted later in the afternoon to calm the students down.
... but it may not have had the desired effect:
Erica Gray's fifth-grade daughter was one of the morning's altar servers. Gray attended the afternoon crisis intervention, where students were brought into a room and asked to write down their feelings about the incident. Gray said Sauraskas was there and continued to berate the students until he was told to leave by Fr. Arenc Falana, the pastor of Incarnation Church.
It seems that some parents don't read the bulletin: not having seen the note that the dial on the way-back machine had been set to 1934 or thereabouts, they reacted the way modern-day Catholics react:
"I pay tuition to have my children verbally abused by a 'Man of God' at mass? I got the robocall apology so it must have been pretty bad," Nielsen said, whose daughter will be attending St. Alexander School in Palos Heights next fall. "I called the rectory and we are no longer parishioners at that place."
I don't suppose much commentary is required by me on this incident. Let's concede that emotions are running high at this parish because the school is slated to close. Even so: it would be difficult to dream up a more wrong-headed approach to appeal to Catholic families who, frankly, have a lot of other options for spending time on their Sundays, and other options for educating their children.
Calling someone a "lousy Catholic" because they failed to go to Mass on one particular Sunday seems somewhat over the top.
ReplyDeleteBut if parents fail to go to Mass on a regular basis, then they ARE lousy Catholics, aren't they? They're relegating catechesis to the school and failing to set a good example about meeting one's holy obligations.
I understand that you attract more flies (and their money) with sugar than vinegar. But it's hard to know the back story when Father went ape on the kids. Maybe he felt the school was fighting an uphill battle with recalcitrant parents and this was his last chance to send a message home with the kiddies.
Crisis intervention? Geez Louise.
The Boy's Catholic school had a requirement that one or both parents attend at least one Friday mass per month, and the school secretary had a clip board for attendance, and she wasn't afraid to use it. We got a crisp little note after one of those "I thought if was YOUR week to do it" mix-ups with Raber. I tried to explain, but she said, "This is one day out of 30. If it were up to me, a parent would be here at every Friday morning Mass or we'd expell the family."
She was a bitch, but she was right.
I would say that the kids shouldn't be blamed for the parents choosing not to drag the kids to mass each Sunday. The kids already are upset because their school is closing; that's not their fault, either. Kids feel guilty about things that isn't their fault; adults shouldn't exploit that.
DeleteDoes it make one a lousy Catholic if one doesn't go to mass every week? I guess that's the traditional view (and it's pretty much the implication of canon law, which still requires weekly attendance). But it's manifest that a lot of parents these days don't agree with the traditional view and don't give a rat's patootie about canon law. Not sure if you read the newspaper article all the way through, but it included this snippet from one of the parents:
"I don't go to mass but I'm at all the fundraisers and often I'm running them."
She thinks she's committed to the faith community. Why doesn't she go to mass? Could be because she's a lousy Catholic, I guess. Could be that she has some of the same issues with the church that some folks who hang out here have. Could be that they're not Catholic at all; Catholic schools take in non-Catholic students.
I think there are a lot of parents these days who would tell your school's clipboard wielder where to stuff it. How is a working parent supposed to make her/himself available for a weekday mass?
This basic situation is the same at every parish I know of, including ours: it drives the staff crazy that parents put their kids through the school or the religious ed program but don't bring them to mass. That's where we are today. It would be better if they came every week, but they don't. So, given that status quo - what do we do? I don't think guilt-tripping the kids is the answer. But I've known priests over the years who would stoop to that. The bully priest was a recognizable type during my childhood.
I just don't understand why parents would send their kids to a Catholic school if they weren't enthusiastically practicing (i.e., non-lousy) Catholics and didn't want to give their kids the extra encouragement to be non-lousy Catholics.
DeleteThe philosophy at The Boy's school was that that kids could not get a proper Catholic education without a proper example from their parents. It was rigorous, difficult, inconvenient, and the school wasn't particularly nice, welcoming, or understanding about any hardships it might have imposed. The school secretary was merely following policy.
A few years later, when I realized that I didn't have any business calling myself a Catholic, I would have felt obligated to play along or take my kid out of the school. I didn't expect that it would change its rules to fit my lousy Catholic habits.
I know many nice people from that parish who have made excellent parents and good Catholics. So the strict policies worked for them.
I thought our pastor put it well in a homily. He asked the rhetorical question of whether people could have a relationship with God if they neither prayed nor attended Mass regularly (since he was speaking to Catholics). He said, "Sure they can. Just not a very good one." He asked how good a relationship one could have with a loved one if they didn't make spending time with that person a priority; if something else was always more important.
DeleteAnd yeah, I agree with Jim about the clipboard wielder. Sometime I'm going to do a post about parish "boarder collies" and bossypants.
The Mass nourishes Catholics and reinforces the Church's teachings. If you are a Catholic, it's your conduit to God and heaven.
DeleteKatherine, as you write your post about the bossypantses, it might be useful to imagine the parish without them. They're insufferable, but they're doing the work others sometimes peter out on. The extent to which they are quelling others who would like to contribute but don't want to be under constant critical scrutiny is something that concerns me.
I will probably have to repeat my favorite monsignor (true) story before this is all over. But I have to get straight first on who, exactly, this Msgr. Sauraskas guy is, since the pastor, a mere Father, eventually shut him down. Was he the diocesan hit man sent to Mau-Mau the parish, or was he the diocesan flak catcher come to fight back against parents Mau-Mauing the bishop? Or was this just a drive-by shooting?
ReplyDeleteEvery parish around here has parents who are with it only until the last of the kids is confirmed and who will not hear from either the parents or the kids again unless a bride-to-be wants to use the church for her wedding because it would make grandmother happy. I do not understand that form of Catholicism, but it may be more widely spread than mine.
Tom, according to the newspaper article, he's a retired priest who lives in the parish's rectory. He may be a pastor emeritus who still lives at the parish, or he may be a retired pastor or priest from some other parish who was invited to live at this parish's rectory, presumably in return for helping out with masses, funerals and whatever else he's willing to do in retirement. I've seen both.
DeleteSo...the priest was yelling at the kids (and parents) who were at Mass at the time, for not going to Mass. Seems a bit ironic. Not to mention the wrong time and place to carry on this discussion. I agree with Jean that regular Mass attendance is an important part of being a practicing Catholic. But the time to be getting that across, to the kids at least, would be during regular catechesis, which hopefully they were getting in school. With a discussion about why good Catholics go to Mass. If not the actual last day of school Mass, it is close enough that letting loose with a blast of verbal buckshot is the wrong thing to inspire good Mass attendance during summer and beyond. Maybe a parents' meeting was in order to emphasize the importance of setting a good example for the kids by one's own Mass attendance.
ReplyDeleteCan't get on board with the crisis intervention thing. I guess going to school to pre-VII Dominican nuns made me a little more restrained in what I define as a crisis.
FWIW - I wouldn't call someone who came to mass only once in a great while a "lousy Catholic", but I would say that there is an opportunity (mandate?) to evangelize that person.
ReplyDeleteWe - or at least I - would wish to help the parents begin to cultivate the habit of weekly mass attendance.
This is where the rubber meets the road with the New Evangelization: re-evangelizing those of us for whom the fire seems to have died down, and the spark may have gone out. They (we) need some romance put back into the marriage between them and the church.
This poor monsignor, whom I'm imagining to be an old guy from the old school of being a diocesan priest, is going about it the wrong way. Instead of being mean to the kids, he might consider treating the adults as conversation partners in the project to strengthen their bonds with the faith community.
More generally, I really believe that the Catholic church is going to need to make substantial changes in the coming years - changes that equal or exceed the magnitude of the post-Vatican II church. And that's because society is changing right now, beneath our feet. Francis, bless him, seems wise enough to discern that and seems to be trying to set the table for it.
Francis's example is heartening because he's an old dog, and he seems capable of learning new tricks. One of my major concerns is that, at the grass-roots level, our parishes are led by old dogs who think they already know how to be a church leader, because they've been one for 20 or 30 or 40 years already. And their energy is waning. And they live in a sort of parish bubble. None of this is conducive to making significant changes.
I don't know what Catholic education is like today, but I sincerely believe that my education (elementary school through high school) was a very successful indoctrination that left me perpetually uncertain about what goes on in my own head. There is so much of Catholic teaching that I can't accept, but on the other hand, I can't quite shake it, either. (That is why I am so fond of the following Lenin quote: "Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.") If I were to call myself a Catholic, you can bet I would attend Mass every Sunday. What the **** would you send your kids to Catholic school for if you did not accept the most clear-cut Catholic teachings yourself? Are these people nuts?
ReplyDeleteThe stakes here, from the viewpoint I was taught in Catholic school, could not possibly be higher—salvation or damnation. In many ways, I wouldn't mind thinking of myself as a Catholic, and being somewhat involved with the Church, if I could decide for myself whether or not to go to Mass, or whether or not to accept and live by the Catholic teachings on sexuality. I could call myself a Catholic if I could decide for myself whether or not to reject dogma. I do not pretend to speak for Jean Raber, but I think she might agree with me that it sounds like many of the people who think of themselves as Catholic are able to do so because they take what the Church teaches a lot less seriously than those of us who cannot bring ourselves to self-identify as Catholic. It seems to have been a real problem for me that I took my Catholic education quite seriously, while others who took it less seriously either have had no problem simply leaving it all behind or who still think of themselves as Catholic in good standing while ignoring any of the teachings of the Church that they don't like without giving it any serious thought.
"The stakes here, from the viewpoint I was taught in Catholic school, could not possibly be higher—salvation or damnation."
DeletePlease don't take this as my being judgmental about your personal situation, but simply that your observation here, which I think is admirably honest on your part, struck a chord with something I proclaimed earlier this morning. This is from the Gospel reading for the Solemnity of the Ascension this year - it's from the conclusion of Mark's Gospel:
Go into the whole world
and proclaim the gospel to every creature.
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved;
whoever does not believe will be condemned.
-- Mark 16:15b-16
Jim, I don't suppose it makes any difference to you that virtually no biblical scholar thinks those words were written by Mark. That they are "canonical" is a matter of Church authority, which of those who are not Catholic are not bound to accept.
DeleteBut I am not sure what you are saying. I thought you were really quite sympathetic to the parents who did not attend church. Perhaps I misunderstood you. I think we can all agree that the monsignor's behavior was unfortunate, but according to Catholic teaching as I understand it, he was right.
It would be one thing if the Catholic school under discussion was one of the expensive private schools that my own high school has seemed to become (as opposed to the heavily subsidized school it was when I went there, when even the poorest families could send their children there). But if there is substantial support from non-lousy Catholics, then I think there is good reason for them to be seriously irked by the lousy Catholics (both students and parents).
Over on Strange Notions, there is a lot of discussion about believing and being saved in contrast to not believing and being condemned. I am just baffled by the idea of choosing to believe something. I always think of the Queen in Through the Looking Glass.
********************
"I can't believe that!" said Alice.
"Can't you?" the Queen said in a pitying tone. "Try again: draw a long breath, and shut your eyes."
Alice laughed. "There's no use trying," she said: "one can't believe impossible things."
"I daresay you haven't had much practice," said the Queen. "When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."
********************
I have no control over whether I believe something. I either do or I don't. Of course, when I doubt something, I can always dig deeper. But digging deeper sometimes just makes for increasing doubts.
The way I interpret that passage from Mark that Jim quoted is the same way Luther did. That one is saved by confession of faith in Jesus Christ, rather than any works.
DeleteMy mom grew up Baptst, and though she became a devout Catholic, certain things from her Protestant background never left her. I often heard "By grace are ye saved, and that not of yourselves, lest any should boast." Not sure I quoted it right, she of course would have learned it from the KJV. Sometimes hearing that point of view is a necessary corrective for those like myself who tend to be a bit Pelagian.
I should add that I don't entirely buy into the "salvation is by faith alone" point of view. But I do believe that it depends more on God's mercy and love than on anything we do.
Delete"But I am not sure what you are saying. I thought you were really quite sympathetic to the parents who did not attend church. Perhaps I misunderstood you. I think we can all agree that the monsignor's behavior was unfortunate, but according to Catholic teaching as I understand it, he was right."
DeleteI wasn't really trying to make a point, other than that you happened to write something that dovetailed with the Gospel for the day.
I'd like to think I'm at least somewhat sympathetic to parents in the situation we're discussing - certainly, more so than the monsignor (and the other adults in the church - that's the little detail of that incident that frosts me the most). I would note that those of us who post regularly here are, on average, a generation or more older than the parents of young school-age children, and we should recognize that our experience growing up was different than theirs. Our peer age-group parents stopped going to church every week, so their children, who are today's young parents, aren't starting from a foundation of habitual church attendance (talking in broad strokes here; naturally, it doesn't apply to every particular individual). So the monsignor, and the official church, is asking these parents to do more than they're accustomed to. It's a big ask. It's a different magnitude of demand than, "Just keep going to church every week as you have been doing already".
Driving home from my school drop-off today, I tuned into NPR in the midst of a discussion of wedding dresses - I think it was a royal wedding-inspired segment. Some subject matter expert or other was noting that the average age of today's bride is 27, whereas in 1960 it was 22. She said something along the lines of, "a wedding day no longer marks the transition of a bride from child to adult", and she noted that the vast majority of brides today are sexually experienced already and many of them were living with their partner prior to the marriage. I note these fun facts to point out that family formation is a lot different than the norms that prevailed when most of our parents (and maybe ourselves) formed our families. Catholics don't get married right away, and they don't necessarily marry other Catholics. And we haven't gotten into economic changes, women in the workforce, and the prevalence of divorce. The sum of these social realities has an impact on how today's Catholics receive the church's norms and ideals regarding family life, church attendance and Catholic school expectations.
This is precisely what the New Evangelization needs to figure out: how to welcome families whose lives don't conform to the family life of Ozzie and Harriett into Catholic discipleship. Taunting the kids: probably the wrong approach.
David, you did a good job summarizing my thoughts.
DeleteJim, yes, there are nicer ways to evangelize than calling people names (showing up when someone is sick, dying, needs help), but not all believers are nice, and they muddle through what needs to be said in their own way, as Father S. did. He made it crystal clear what he felt was at stake.
You'd rather say some parents at the school need evangelization and romance. But the fact remains that you wouldn't think so unless you agreed with Fr. S. that there was something deficient or lousy in their current practice.
I love that Alice in Wonderland citation. Belief is a mystery to me, but I'd simply note that this is a great pre-Pentecost discussion. I'm pretty sure our faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit. I feel the little stings and nips of doubts and difficulties. Some days, it makes me feel weak, some days it doesn't.
DeleteJean, you're right - I don't think it's dandy that Catholic parents don't worship with their families regularly.
DeleteThe Spirit blows where it wills. Since at least Nostra Aetate the Church has recognized that people outside the Church are legitimately following the Spirit, and that institutions into which they follow him share in some way in Christ's redemptive acts. The realization is slow in coming to this country under the rhetorical thumb of fundamentalists who claim they are victims of discrimination. But that's what the Church teaches.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I, too, was taught something different in my 16 years of Catholic education. But 1) what I just said was present, albeit not emphasized, in the teaching even then, and 2) few of the Catholics who have been paying attention would now say "no salvation without acceptance of Jesus as Lord and Savior." (3) Even fewer would say salvation is guaranteed by making the nine first Fridays, and the Church didn't say that then, but that is what a lot of people heard.)
Attacking the presumed Catholics who aren't there before before a congregation of Catholics who are there never has made much sense to me. On the Sunday after 9/11, many score presumed Catholics no one had ever seen before showed up for Mass. Instead of asking wherethehell they had been, the pastor thanked them for turning to the Mass under the trying national circumstances and knowing we regulars would there for them when they needed us. He added that we needed them as well and so were happy to have them.
(He then went into how, as a youth, he had been injured in a terrorist bombing while playing hooky from school to buy the "Grease"cast album. All the credit he gained for having undergone the bombing was lost when he revealed the object of his quest.)
Re doubts and tactics best used with apostates: I have a "risen Christ" crucifix in my room. I'm looking at it now. It is hard to watch someone die and believe with any certainty that they will arise, freshly cleaned and washed in a halo of light. The crucifix is a "maybe." It doesn't demand that I believe it. It simply presents a possibility.
ReplyDeleteI think that's what I admire about Anglicanism/Catholicism. So much of the message is iconographic and symbolic. It suggests, it invites, it speaks to the imagination. It is not like a lot of Protestant exhortation that often excludes and draws lines and constricts imagination.
I think this explains why my faith took off when I spent a lot of time hanging out in English churches and cathedrals.
And why it often dwindles when the service starts and people start talking about what you're "supposed" to believe and do in order to prove it.
"This is precisely what the New Evangelization needs to figure out: how to welcome families whose lives don't conform to the family life of Ozzie and Harriett into Catholic discipleship. Taunting the kids: probably the wrong approach."
ReplyDeleteDon't want this snip to get lost, as I think it's a good point. And I do see a lot of "right" and "wrong" approach examples in our local parish, as I think we all must.
The Church Ladies want the Catholic equivalent of Ozzie and Harriet back--happily married couple, stay-at-home mom, four or five kids at Mass every Sunday, kids don't act up, they graduate to altar servership, the firstborn son becomes a priest and the rest of the kids pop lots of babies after marrying good Catholics (or mainstream Protestants who convert and keep their mouths shut).
I don't honestly think they WANT anyone to drop out of the Church, but their lack of imagination (and fear of the sins and messes that plague modern life) is a definite problem in their being willing or able to deal with the bedraggled messes that Jesus wants to bring in.
They can deal with a divorce/annulment or maybe a cohabitation where there are young children. They're fairly good at getting the horse before the cart, if belatedly.
Where they fall apart is when people don't live happily ever after in the Church--marital problems, gay kids, kids getting married outside the Church, people using artificial contraception, divorces, liturgical innovations, kids never showing up again after confirmation. They don't get why it doesn't "take" for some people. They can't stop decorating, fussing over vestments, ordering donuts, planning fundraisers, wrapping First Communion trinkets, etc. etc. long enough to just listen to people.
Jean, you've made a good point throughout this discussion that the church needs "doers" like the Church Ladies. Maybe they're the Marthas of the community.
DeleteI would say that the Church Ladies, and Clipboard Lady, need to keep doing the things they're doing, as I'm sure it's all necessary work. But start doing in a different way, or at least with a different attitude. Clipboard Catholicism is a real turn-off - at least it is to me, and I'm a weekly mass-goer.
Instead of requiring a parent to attend a school mass a Friday every month, maybe Clipboard Lady could focus on gratitude and recognition of those parents who are able to make this commitment.
FWIW: when I was in Catholic elementary school in the 1960s and 70s, parents weren't required to attend our class and school masses (although they would have been welcome had they wished to come). The school was actually a three block walk from the church, so it was kind of a project to move us back and forth to the church each week. But my recollection is that it all went pretty smoothly. But maybe there is some compelling reason that parents need to be part of the effort. I do know, from my days as a student as well as, more recently, a Catholic school parent, that the school relies on parent volunteer time in order to run. At various times my wife (who was considerably less enthusiastic about Catholic schooling than me - she went to public schools for 12 years because her mom was a Chicago Public School teacher) was a playground mom, a lunch room mom, a library mom, a Brownie leader, and probably other things that I don't remember. This was during her stay-at-home years. So I understand the school requiring a certain number of hours of involvement of every household. That happens in some public school activities as well (the school band being particularly insane in this respect - that may be material for another post some day). I don't think it's wrong for a mission-focused org like a Catholic school to expect buy-in from the parents beyond paying tuition.
I don't think it's wrong, either. You want your child to have a Catholic education, be an enthusiastic Catholic. If you aren't an enthusiastic Catholic, think about why you want the kid to have a parochial education, and suck it up or take the kid out.
DeleteThe problem with your recognition program is that the stay-at-home parents will continue to get all the glory, perpetuating the notion that the best Catholics are the ones who can afford high tuition on one income. IMO, perhaps the best Catholics are the ones who don't have time to volunteer or go to weekday mass because they're trying to make tuition.
When I was a Catholic grade school kid, things such as music and art were considered "frills" that the nuns didn't have time for. My mom considered otherwise, and was an unpaid music teacher on Fridays for years. Another classmate's mom had an art degree and was an unpaid art teacher on Fridays. I always looked forward to Fridays. But I don't think I properly appreciated the sacrifice these women made. We've made a little progress, in that the arts aren't so much considered frills now.
Delete"... the arts aren't so much considered frills now."
DeleteReally? There is no funding for voc/tech education in public schools. Most do not offer art. Music is often relegated to band, which would be cut if it didn't provide a soundtrack for the jock events. Home ec is dead. You could take French, Spanish, German, AND Latin. For four years. When these things are offered, usually one teacher gets spread around the entire district. The stuff I had in school in the 1960s was frilly as all heck compared to what it looks like now.
I guess we are lucky here in that the public high school has good art and music. My younger son took art all four years in high school and majored in graphic design in college. The older son graduated where we used to live, and took band for 6 years, and French for 4 years. Though come to think of it they've both been out for over 20 years. what I am hearing from parents now is that things are very high pressure. Everybody has to have a 4-0 average and ace the ACT.
DeleteWow! When I read Jim's post initially, I assumed it would not prompt much controversy. Imagine my surprise when catching up today.
ReplyDeleteI did not imagine that the folk who read this site would disagree with Jim on this - a priest chose to use a mass - a MASS - to berate and humiliate children from ages 11-13 (roughly), a vulnerable age to begin with. Children who were at mass, but who may not be there every Sunday. I don't know of any 11-13 year olds who have driver's licenses, and assume that most must be driven there by a parent. Perhaps ALL those kids live within walking distance of the church, but somehow I doubt it. Perhaps 100% of those kids are baptized Catholic, but I doubt that also.
If the priest felt compelled to launch into a tirade, he should have chosen a different time, place, and audience. Perhaps at the PTA meeting? Perhaps call a "special" meeting of parents?
Lashing out at kids during mass - which is supposed to be a holy, prayerful, "reverent" time - is SO WRONG.
What an UN-Christian thing to do. And, to add insult to injury, the priest's nasty diatribe was supported by the adults there.
Is it any wonder that so few kids stay Catholic when the choice is up to them?
And what's with the mandatory one Friday/month parental attendance? That never happened when I was a parochial school student. We kids were marched over to the church, but there was no mandate for parents to be there. And these days it's a whole lot tougher on parents. Usually both work - they drop the kids off at school and head off to work and hope they aren’t late. Even if there is a stay-at-home parent, they have lots of demands too. They may have younger kids, babies, who don't act well during mass and Friday mass would be just another stressor. Sundays are tough enough. As someone who was a stay-at-home parent full-time for 4 years, I also know that giving up an hour of alone time - so rare for parents, working outside or inside the home - can be asking a lot
Nothing wrong with expecting parental support beyond tuition - parents do a whole lot of work for most schools (at least in not-poor areas), public and private, without monetary compensation.
As far as the not-so-good-Father's complaint that the parishoners who support the school are somehow damaged by the absence of some parents on Sundays, they might want to check out the tuition schedules. Maybe it's different in Illinois, but in my area (and in Calif where my no-longer-Catholic son lives and is looking at local Catholic schools for his son) the parochial schools charge tuition according to a formula. Those who are registered in the parish - and put a minimum, clearly stipulated amount of $ into an envelope every week, and place it in the basket - are charged the least. Non-parishoner Catholics are charged slightly more. And those who aren’t Catholic, but who send their kids are hit with a sizable premium. My son does not live in a neighborhood that has "good" public schools. The only “affordable” private schools are Catholic and evangelical protestant. Since the latter is unthinkable as far as he and his wife are concerned, they will pay the non-Catholic premium at one of the Catholic schools. I will help them as best I can to identify one with the fewest Church Ladies and others who are more "law 'n order" Catholic than actual Christ-following christians.
I am a once-Catholic, like David, and Jimmy. Jean wavers. But I was a dutiful Catholic mother - Sunday mass every week (or almost every week), tuition to Catholic schools for all of our kids. One is still practicing, mostly because his wife is quite committed. The other two have not, and will not, baptize their children Catholic. I don’t blame them.
Not to sound nosy, but why does your no-longer-Catholic son want to send his kids to a parochial school if there are good public schools?
DeleteWe didn't pull The Boy out of his Catholic school because of the policies about Mass attendance or tuition. We were new Catholics and gung-ho about doing everything right. But after the first year, I could not ignore the fact that the quality of education was inferior and the school could not handle kids with learning disabilities other than through punishment. The teachers and admin were wholly unwilling to bring parents on as partners in education (except through mandatory volunteer hours). Completely different in the public schools. We were all happier there.
Jean, as I said above, the public schools in their neighborhood are NOT very good schools. The only (barely) affordable alternatives are evangelical protestant "christian" schools, and Catholic parochial schools. They will not consider the first at all - and will do their best to avoid the Catholic version of evangelical protestant in the parochial schools. Since there are about 6 Catholic schools within reasonable driving distance, I will help them pick a school, because I am more attuned to the signs of a evangelical protestant-cloned Catholic parishes than they are.
ReplyDeleteHe graduated from his Catholic high school and never looked back. The academics were decent, if not brilliant (as the Brits would say). If I had realized that the high school was not a Vatican II type school but an EWTN version of Catholicism school I wouldn't have sent our two oldest sons there. The school is only 20 minutes from our home, and on my husband's way to work, so was fairly convenient. We live in the Archdiocese of Washington DC, but the high school was in the Arlington Diocese in Virginia. I did not realize until too late that the Arlington Diocese is one of the most conservative in the country. I did not realize that the bishop banned female altar servers, and that communion was bread alone and that these rules were neon signs flashing "beware" of pre-Vatican II church. I didn't know about how different the Catholic church was across the river from DC and Maryland. The diocese now is marginally more progressive today (the bishop lets the pastors decide if girls can serve at the altar and if wine can be offered to the congregation - most still adhere to the previous rules even given the freedom to choose), but when our two older sons were there, it was a flashback to the 1950s. Most of the kids who were friends of our sons and went to that high school are no longer practicing Catholics. Surprise, surprise.
We sent our youngest (who went to a Catholic independent school from 4-8th) to an Episcopal high school - it was a great school, both academically and in its approach to teaching religion and values. The teachers didn't just teach, but modeled christian behavior, unlike many of the staff at the Catholic high school. Most of them acted a lot like this Msgr, the clipboard lady, and the adults at the mass who piled onto the kids after the priest attacked them.
Sometimes Catholics should think about the (in?)famous Protestant acronym - WWJD?
Oops, sorry, read that wrong about the public schools.
DeleteSmart to scope out what "flavor" Catholic school your getting. I was disheartened with CCD in the local parish and shopped around, asking about whether other churches could cope with learning disabilities. I got an enthusiastic response from a Lansing parish. I wanted to go down there despite the 40 minute drive and Michigan winters, but Raber felt we should stay with the home parish. So. Felt we missed the bus there.
Anne, for what it's worth: on the whole, I'd have to say that my faith survived, rather than was strengthened by, my Catholic high school experience. I was in high school in the mid-late 1970s, so a different era than your son, a lot closer to the Council, and most of the teachers and administrators there were formed in the pre-Vatican II church. Still, some of them seemed to have imbued the spirit of the Council. But a lot hadn't. This was in the Rockford, IL diocese, another notoriously conservative diocese. It was a pretty authoritarian place - they were very big on discipline. I don't do well in that kind of an environment; guess it's a good thing I never went into the military.
DeleteThe public schools in Rockford were (and still are) pretty bad. But my parents would have sent us to Catholic school even if they were good.
It was a lot cheaper then, too. My tuition my freshman year was $400. And there was as sliding scale for subsequent family members - my parents never had four children at a time in high school but there were some years where they had three. I'm sure the diocese was subsidizing the high school at that time; I doubt that happens anymore. And I'm sure the teachers were paid peanuts.
I had a lot of friends, and many of them are still my friends. I had a pretty good education in the basics (except religion, which is kind of ironic), and there are some artistically talented people who came out of that school at that time without the benefit of top-of-the-line art funding - that could be a separate post sometime.
But the authoritarian/discipline aspect is what left the bad taste in my mouth. This monsignor reminds of some of the aspects of that school that I disliked so much.
Jim, you are the generation in between. I spent most of the 60s in high school and college. High school was public, college was Catholic. I was ready to leave during college, but a theology professor convinced me that Vatican II would change the church in great ways. Well, it might have, but was stopped in its tracks by Francis' two predecessors.
ReplyDeleteOur sons were in high school in the 90s and early 2000s. The Catholic independent school they went to through 8th was pretty good - academically and in terms of modeling VII Catholicism. The high school across the river was mired in the 40s and 50s, as was the whole diocese (still is). It "kept" some of the kids, but lost the majority.