Gonzaga University

While Vatican Meets, Catholic Colleges Celebrate Sexual Abuse

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Even while the Vatican meets to address sexual abuse by Catholic priests, students at U.S. Catholic colleges will stage theatrical performances that glorify—with explicitly religious language—an adult’s creepy and manipulative seduction of a 16-year-old.

It’s an outrage, especially given the similarity of the play to the abuse of young boys and men, and in some cases girls, by many Catholic priests. Yet Catholic colleges have repeated this celebration of sexual abuse and perversion for 20 years.

Will any Catholic college leader apologize for The Vagina Monologues? Every year, just as the Church approaches the holy season of Lent, Catholic college students—and the faculty departments and college leaders who enable their performances—continue to perform this play and dance on the broken souls of sexual abuse victims.

I am proud that The Cardinal Newman Society has led the fight against The Vagina Monologues on Catholic campuses. Shame on those who have allowed and even defended it!

Every spring, usually around Saint Valentine’s Day, colleges nationwide host the Monologues, a vile play in which a character reminisces happily about her own sexual abuse while a troubled 16-year-old. She recalls how a 24-year-old woman plied her with alcohol then had sexual relations with her. But instead of condemning the act, the victim declares the rape her “salvation” that “raised her into a kind of heaven”—a claim that glorifies homosexual predation.

This resembles many of the crimes involving Catholic priests. And we know from victims’ testimony the severe harm and anguish—not heavenly bliss!—that is caused by such abuse.

Moreover, the age of consent for sexual activity is 17 or 18 in 20 states, which means The Vagina Monologues promotes statutory rape. The play originally had the girl at 13 years old, stating defiantly, “If it was a rape, it was a good rape.” The playwright, Eve Ensler, later dropped the line admitting rape and changed the character’s age to 16 to match the legal age of consent for sexual activity in many states. Still, the play clearly describes a rape.

At Least Eight Colleges This Year

Performances of the Monologues at Catholic colleges began in 1999 and peaked at 32 campuses in 2003, according to the Newman Society’s annual tally. Thankfully, the number has declined as the novelty of the play for students has diminished and Catholic leaders have condemned the play.

One of the most forceful critiques was published in 2008 by former Bishop John D’Arcy of Fort Wayne-South Bend, who opposed performances at the University of Notre Dame:

While claiming to deplore violence against women, the play at the same time violates the standards of decency and morality that safeguard a woman’s dignity and protect her, body and soul, from sexual predators… The play depicts, exalts and endorses female masturbation, which is a sin. It depicts, exalts, and endorses a sexual relationship between an adult woman and a child, a minor, which is a sin and also a crime. It depicts and exalts the most base form of sexual relationship between a man and a woman. These illicit sexual actions are portrayed as paths to healing, and the implication is that the historic, positive understanding of heterosexual marriage as the norm is what we must recover from.

But still today—even amid the worsening crisis of clergy abuse and cover-up, implicating even the most prominent bishops—some Catholic colleges persist in the scandal of hosting and even sponsoring The Vagina Monologues. Two colleges will brazenly host the play at the same time that the Vatican holds its conference on sex abuse from Feb. 21-Feb. 24.

The Newman Society has confirmed performances on eight Catholic campuses, with others likely. Confirmed performances include:

  • Boston College (Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts): The Vagina Monologues is on the public events calendar of the Jesuit College’s Robsham Theater Arts Center for Valentine’s Day, with repeat performances on Friday and Saturday, Feb. 15 and 16.
  • College of the Holy Cross (Worcester, Massachusetts): According to the Facebook page of the Feminist Forum, a Monologues performance is scheduled on the Jesuit college campus on Wednesday, Feb. 13.
  • DePaul University (Chicago, Illinois): The Vincentian university hosted its 20th annual production of the Monologues with four on-campus performances between Feb. 7 and Feb. 10.
  • Gonzaga University (Spokane, Washington): The Jesuit university’s performance of the Monologues—open to the public for the first time—is scheduled for Valentine’s Day. It is sponsored by the Theatre and Dance Department.
  • Holy Names University (Oakland, California): By email to the Newman Society, the organizer of several “information sessions” about The Vagina Monologues confirmed that a public performance is scheduled on Thursday, Feb. 21, at the College’s Valley Center for Performing Arts. The College is affiliated with the Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus.
  • Loyola University Maryland (Baltimore, Maryland): Sponsored by the Gender and Sexuality Studies Department, the Monologues will be performed on the Jesuit university’s campus on Valentine’s Day and Friday, Feb. 15.
  • Regis College (Weston, Mass.): The College sponsored by the Sisters of St. Joseph will host the Monologues on campus on Friday, Feb. 22, and Saturday, Feb. 23.
  • Xavier University (Cincinnati, Ohio): The Monologues will be performed on Saturday, March 2—the last weekend before Lent begins—at the Jesuit university. It will be sponsored by the Theatre Department.

In addition, according to a student Facebook page, auditions for the Monologues were held at the Jesuit Loyola University of Chicago on Feb. 6 and 7. No performance date was announced.

On its website, V-Day also claims that performances are scheduled at three other Catholic colleges which could not be verified. In an email to the Newman Society on Monday, a Merrimack College spokesman said that he is unaware of any plans for a performance, despite campus performances in prior years and a V-Day announcement indicating that proceeds will be donated to Planned Parenthood Boston.

Gonzaga Doubles Down

Perhaps the most astonishing of this year’s performances of The Vagina Monologues is that at Gonzaga University.

In 2002, when most Catholics first became aware of the sexual abuse cover-ups in the Archdiocese of Boston and elsewhere, Gonzaga’s Jesuit president rightly banned the play from campus. Father Robert Spitzer, S.J., was especially offended by the play’s celebration of rape. He said that the play is opposed to the “Catholic and Christian view of marriage.”

That ban was reversed in 2011 by Father Spitzer’s successor, Thayne McCulloh, who remains president of Gonzaga today. The 2011 performance was sponsored by the English Department, Honors Program, Institute for Hate Studies, Sociology Department, and Women and Gender Studies Program.

But the Monologues did not return to Gonzaga until this year—of all years, given the new revelations of sex abuse and cover-up. Moreover, this will be the very first time that Gonzaga invites the public to share in its celebration of sexual abuse and perversity, with the official sponsorship of the university’s Theatre and Dance Department.

“The Vagina Monologues are powerful for the voices they give to so many people who are usually silenced by society,” Leslie Stamoolis, assistant professor of theater and dance and director of the play, told The Gonzaga Bulletin. “And telling those stories, in those voices, gives power to the narratives — it reminds us all that these stories matter, and in fact every woman’s story matters.”

Except, apparently, for the agonizing testimony of those women and men who have been victimized by sexual abuse—whose hellish ordeal is declared by Gonzaga to be their “salvation.” The crimes of some priests and the failure of bishops to disclose the crimes is appalling. But when Catholic students parade sexual perversion and abuse onstage in the midst of this crisis, the crimes are compounded. And the complicity of academic leaders and their blindness to the harm perpetuated by The Vagina Monologues is indefensible.

This article was first published at the National Catholic Register.

Excited School Children in Uniform with Hands Up

Yes, Let’s ‘Expose’ Catholic Schools

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Faithful Catholic education is under attack. And since we just celebrated Catholic Schools Week, it’s a great time to launch a counter-offensive that goes beyond clichéd cheerleading for lukewarm schools.

Consider what has occurred over just the last few weeks: First, leftist activists pilloried Second Lady Karen Pence for volunteering at an evangelical Christian school—one that upholds the same standards for teachers that Catholic schools should embrace, when they are courageous enough to insist on the moral formation of their students and the consistent witness of every teacher.

Among the critics was a professor who taught 10 years at the Catholic Dominican University in Illinois. He used the controversy to target not only Pence’s school but all religious schools and colleges with moral standards for employees, calling them “anti-American.” He argued that “no one, anywhere, ever, should risk employment because of who they love or what consensual activities they choose to engage in with other adults.”

Except that such behavior is an example to kids. And if Catholic schools want to claim that teachers are “ministers of the faith” under law—as they should—then pervasive sin ought to be a disqualifier.

Then, as we all witnessed ad nauseum, the media piled on Nick Sandmann and his fellow pro-life students from Covington Catholic School, before realizing that a widely circulated video actually shows that the boys were the victims of an aggressive and hateful confrontation while waiting for their bus home to Kentucky. It’s not the error that was most offensive. It’s the vitriol with which the media quickly turned on pro-life Catholic kids. (Sure, the MAGA hats drew fire too, but I’m convinced that Catholic identity added fuel to the fire.)

To cap it all off, New York Times reporter Dan Levin jumped on the bandwagon and announced plans to write about the social media campaign #ExposeChristianSchools, which was launched as an attack on religious education. I suspect that the Times intended to accumulate allegations of discrimination—especially in the realm of sexuality and gender—but in fact Levin received a flood of very positive reports from Catholic and others defending and celebrating their schools.

Give Your Testimony

So what’s a good Catholic to do about the growing animus toward our faith and Catholic schools? The response to the New York Times project, which resulted in a biased article that could have been much worse had Christians not intervened, suggests a counter-measure. For Catholic Schools Week and throughout the year, let’s keep highlighting the best of the best Catholic education.

To be clear, I’m not particularly interested in the broad marketing messages for Catholic schools that have poured out this week. Although it’s encouraging that our dioceses increasingly promote Catholic identity and are not shy about the mission of Catholic education, nevertheless they are unable to distinguish lukewarm Catholic schools from those that inspire and excite faithful Catholic families.

What would truly be exciting—and what would truly stand up to the anti-Catholic bigots who look to tear down or at least water down Catholic education—is for Catholics to witness to the impact of those Catholic educators who are extraordinary. I mean they are not just great with kids, but they truly lead young people to sainthood.

I’m biased in this project, because for many years The Cardinal Newman Society has been devoted to publicly recognizing model Catholic schools and colleges by our Catholic Education Honor Roll and Newman Guide. This week and every week, my staff already works hard to make Catholic families aware of truly faithful Catholic education—and not just the brick-and-mortar institutions, but also the great blessing of homeschooling to many Catholic students.

But the most powerful testimonials are the personal stories from students, parents, alumni and teachers. Those we can’t produce on our own, but we’re eager to re-tell what others can share.

The truth is, despite the growing secularism that corrupts many Catholic institutions, there is also a renewal of faithful Catholic education that is underway in many homes, schools and dioceses. Instead of cowering before the critics and subversives who hate Catholic moral formation, parents and Catholic educators are taking up the front lines, standing firmly and confidently in the truth of our Catholic faith.

It’s stories of truly faithful Catholic education that others need to hear. Because given the scandals at even the highest levels of the Church, I’m not sure that many Catholics believe the good news when we report it.

Families Need Hope

Think about it: most Catholic adults today have never experienced faithful Catholic education as it should be. We’ve done a poor job of catechesis over the last few decades, and many of today’s adults experienced the post-Vatican II meltdown of schools and their presiding religious orders, followed by the rapid hiring of laypeople who didn’t belong in a Catholic classroom. The rapidly declining enrollment in Catholic schools—which still has not leveled off—means that an increasing portion of Catholics never had even a year or two of weak Catholic education. And of course there’s the shameful secularization of many Catholic colleges since the late 1960s.

We might be tempted to conclude that the era of Catholic education is over in the United States. However, a renewal of faithful Catholic education is key to the renewal of the Church and society—to increased vocations and holy priests, well-formed parents and citizens, doctrinal literacy and fidelity, appreciation for Catholic culture and liturgical beauty, and ability to reason with compassion and respect for the common good. Giving up hope for Catholic education is, in my view, giving up on our youth.

In a time when even celebrated priests and once-admired bishops have let us down, it’s all the more difficult to persuade families of the necessity of sainthood—and the value of forming young people for sainthood. But such formation is the vocation of Catholic parents.

By the Grace of God, there are today young people who have been blessed by truly faithful Catholic education. We need to hear from them… to learn from them.

So, if you can testify to the renewal of faithful Catholic education, please tell your story. Find an outlet: a local newspaper, a Catholic blog, a parish lecture, a letter to your niece. Use the hashtag #FaithfulCatholicEd to share your story on social media—it’s wonderful how many Americans have interrupted this anti-Christian campaign with beautiful stories of faithful religious education. Share your story with me at the Newman Society (president@cardinalnewmansociety.org), and it may help us make a stronger case.

Catholic families need good reason to return to Catholic education and reject hollow secular education. The testimony of those who have been blessed by faithful education is key to bringing them back.

But marketing lukewarm schools and scandalous colleges with state-of-the-art facilities and exorbitant tuitions just won’t cut it.

This article was originally published on January 31, 2019 at the National Catholic Register.

Catholic High Schoolers Give Extraordinary Witness at March for Life

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Some of the nation’s best Catholic high schools will be displaying their strong Catholic faith by joining the March for Life in Washington, D.C., this Friday.

These are schools recognized by The Cardinal Newman Society and our Catholic Education Honor Roll. They agree to uphold key principles of Catholic identity, and participation in the March for Life is an excellent way of witnessing to human dignity and teaching a Christian worldview.

Many of the school groups are traveling significant distances to make it to this year’s March, including The Atonement Academy in San Antonio, Texas; Everest Collegiate High School and Academy in Clarkston, Michigan; Bishop Thomas K. Gorman High School in Tyler, Texas; John Paul the Great Academy in Lafayette, Louisiana; The Lyceum in South Euclid, Ohio; St. Francis Xavier High School in Appleton, Wisconsin; St. James Academy in Lenexa, Kans.; St. Joseph High School in South Bend, Indiana and West Catholic High School in Grand Rapids, Michigan

These schools make the most of their time in D.C. St. Francis Xavier, for instance, has an impressive agenda! Students will attend the pro-life youth rally and Mass before the March, visit and celebrate Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, visit the Holocaust Museum (a great pro-life activity), celebrate Mass at St. Matthew’s Cathedral, visit the St. John Paul II National Shrine, pray outside of a Planned Parenthood center, participate in Eucharistic adoration and confession, and share their experiences and impressions during small-group sessions and talks. On the way home, they will stop at Mundelein Seminary for Mass, a tour and breakfast sponsored by the Diocese of Green Bay Vocations Office.

Students in the Schola Cantorum at The Lyceum will sing Palestrina’s Missa Brevis during an Extraordinary Form Mass at St. Dominic’s Church in D.C. before the March. They too will visit the Holocaust Museum and President George Washington’s Mount Vernon.

In addition to several sites in D.C., John Paul the Great Academy makes its long journey from Louisiana a pilgrimage, stopping along the way at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Hanceville, Alabama; the Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes at Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Maryland; and the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Shrine in Emmitsburg.

Students from schools closer to Washington are able to participate more easily, and their numbers are impressive. More than 250 students from Paul VI Catholic High School in Fairfax, Virginia, will be marching this year, after attending the pro-life rally and Mass with Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Arlington Diocese that morning.

Bishop O’Connell High School in Arlington, Virginia, is closing its doors on Friday to allow a group of more than 150 students and chaperones to attend the March in person – and many more are with them in spirit. As part of their “March for Me Initiative,” students from the school’s Pro-Life Club visited parishes in the area and solicited names of parishioners unable to attend the March. The students carry the names with them and pray for their intentions while marching.Other schools may not make it to the March for Life in Washington, but that doesn’t stop them from attending other pro-life events around the country. Students from St. Anne Catholic School in Rock Hill, South Carolina, partnered with the parish youth group to attend last weekend’s March and Rally in Columbia, South Carolina. And in Spring, Texas, Frassati Catholic High School’s Culture of Life Club will sponsor a daylong pilgrimage to the Texas Rally for Life in Austin on Jan. 26.

Faithful Catholic schools play no small part in the renewal of our culture, especially when they bear witness to the dignity of all human life. The sacrifice and witness of these students and their families is an inspiration and blessing.

This article was first published at The National Catholic Register.

Statement Regarding Franciscan University of Steubenville and The Newman Guide

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Earlier this week, a report by Church Militant revealed that the chairman of the English department at Newman Guide-recommended Franciscan University of Steubenville (FUS) assigned a blasphemous and pornographic book in an upper-level class last spring. The University’s spokesman initially seemed to defend the choice as part of the University’s intellectual formation to prepare Catholic students for a secular world.

The Cardinal Newman Society and many others, including Franciscan University parents and alumni, expressed deep concern. We reached out directly to the University and have been communicating with the president, Father Sean Sheridan, TOR.

Yesterday Father Sheridan issued a strong apology and an affirmation of the University’s Catholic identity. He apologized for the University’s initial weak response and acknowledged that the assigned book is “so directly pornographic and blasphemous that it has no place on a Catholic university campus.” He promised action “to immediately review and revise our existing policy on academic freedom to prevent future use of scandalous materials,” and the Newman Society hopes to be able to share that new policy with other Catholic colleges to prevent similar scandals.

Although Father Sheridan insisted in his statement that the professor who assigned the book—then chairman of the University’s English Department—had no “malicious” intent and sought to prepare students “for challenging conversations” with non-Catholics, the professor was quickly replaced as department chair.

Franciscan University’s Catholic Identity

What to make of this? First, it is important to stipulate that an English reading assignment that viciously blasphemes the Mother of God and is explicitly pornographic—all with the apparent intent of leading readers away from God—is reprehensible, disgusting, and without academic merit. It is contrary to the mission of a Catholic college. Catholic families who send their children, at great expense, to Newman Guide colleges do so precisely because they are avoiding these types of problems.

Second, to defend assignment of the book on academic freedom grounds completely warps the true meaning and purpose of academic freedom. As Saint John Paul II explained, academic freedom protects teaching and research within the confines of a professor’s discipline and in conformity to truth, which is foundational to the college’s Catholic mission. (Here are some resources on the often misunderstood notion of academic freedom: LINK and LINK and LINK.)

Third, Father Sheridan’s apology was clear and strong, he promised policy changes that would prevent future scandals, and the University appears to have acted quickly in replacing the professor as chair of the English Department. In charity, we should accept the apology while watching to confirm that this indeed never happens again.

While disappointed and shaken by the scandal, we see very encouraging signs that Franciscan University continues to uphold its much-deserved reputation as a strongly faithful Catholic college. How many other Catholic college presidents would have condemned this error, apologized publicly, and promised to ensure that it will never happen again? What other colleges would have responded with a Holy Hour of Reparation to Mary, Mother of God, and a request that all faculty members—in all academic departments—profess the Oath of Fidelity during a forthcoming Mass? We have long said that no Newman Guide college is immune from error, but Franciscan University is one that retains our great admiration, not least because it has been a leader in the renewal of faithful Catholic education for more than four decades.

This scandal comes on the heels of a series of articles late last year that claimed that Franciscan University administrators were working, or at least hoping, to water down its faithful approach to Catholic higher education. The articles were deeply disconcerting, but they relied primarily on anonymous quotes and conjecture. We responded by reaching out to trusted professors and to University leadership. The professors did express some concern for Franciscan University’s future; they worried about the intent of actions to promote “diversity,” and they cited claims by other professors that Catholic teaching might be undermined. But none of them could or would provide conclusive evidence of any actual problem, on the record. None suggested that faithful Catholic families should avoid Franciscan University or that the Newman Society should remove it from the Newman Guide. On the contrary, they continued to value Franciscan University as a place where students would be strengthened in their faith from the classroom to the dorm room.

Moreover, Franciscan University has an army of faithful faculty members, students, parents, and alumni who are watchmen for the University’s Catholic mission. In that we have great hope! Deo gratias!

The Newman Guide

The fact is that every Catholic college today faces a strong pull from the culture, secular society, and even some Church leaders to compromise Catholic identity in order to be more “modern,” “diverse,” “welcoming,” or “pastoral.” Only those Catholic colleges that are intentional about remaining faithful to their Catholic mission—at all times and in all areas of campus life—will be able to avoid the temptation of compromise and hypocrisy and withstand society’s assault on morality and religious freedom.

Newman Guide colleges are not immune to this pressure to secularize, and they are neither perfect nor identical. To their credit, however, we find that when they discover things contrary or threatening to their mission, they fix it. The Newman Society quietly works with many of our recommended colleges each year to help make them aware of problems, which they diligently work to correct.

More than that, most of the Newman Guide colleges have begun to collaborate with each other through a series of working groups that we established. These help college leaders and staff support each other and learn from each other, developing best practices for maintaining and enhancing Catholic identity. This is good news for the Church and for Catholic families.

The Newman Guide has and continues today to proudly recommend Franciscan University of Steubenville to Catholic families. None of the Newman Guide colleges is right for every student; no college is. But we strongly believe that Catholic education is valuable and that Catholic families should give preference to our recommended colleges, including Franciscan University, for an authentic and faithful Catholic education. Collectively they are the best the Church has to offer today, and with the support and encouragement of faithful Catholic families, God willing they will continue to renew and improve faithful Catholic higher education.

Finally, it is important to note that our recommendations are not written in stone, and the college leaders know this well. Today, we are confident that the ten percent of Catholic colleges recommended in the Newman Guide are serious about upholding their Catholic mission—but if we find sufficient reason to doubt this, after careful review and documentation, we will remove them from the Newman Guide without hesitation. Ultimately the Newman Society’s first priority is to serve the needs of Catholic families and to uphold the authentic mission of Catholic education, wherever and however it may be provided to our precious young people, who deserve genuine Catholic formation.

John Henry Newman

With Second Miracle, Will Newman Be Canonized Soon?

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Deo gratias! The Vatican reportedly has recognized a second miracle through the intercession of Blessed John Henry Newman, paving the way to a possible canonization next year.

Newman—a champion of both fidelity and reason, both of which are sorely lacking in the Church today—could be the perfect saint for our times!

In his sermon, “The Infidelity of the Future,” delivered to seminarians preparing for the priesthood, Newman seemed almost to foresee the great damage that scandals among our priests would cause the faithful, especially in a secular society that is eager to destroy religious faith altogether.

As Newman told the seminarians:

I think that the trials which lie before us are such as would appall and make dizzy even such courageous hearts as St. Athanasius, St. Gregory I, or St. Gregory VII. And they would confess that, dark as the prospect of their own day was to them severally, ours has a darkness different in kind from any that has been before it.

His concern?

The special peril of the time before us is the spread of that plague of infidelity, that the Apostles and our Lord Himself have predicted as the worst calamity of the last times of the Church. …I do not mean to presume to say that this is the last time, but that it has had the evil prerogative of being like that more terrible season, when it is said that the elect themselves will be in danger of falling away.

Already in the 19th century, Newman saw the radical turn against religion by intellectuals and social leaders. He expressed concern that Catholics “shall become more and more objects of distrust to the nation at large,” and perhaps “we may suffer disadvantages which have not weighed upon the Catholic Church since the age of Constantine.”

A special danger to the Church would be the sins of its priests.

With a whole population able to read, with cheap newspapers day by day conveying the news of every court, great and small to every home or even cottage, it is plain that we are at the mercy of even one unworthy member or false brother. …There is an immense store of curiosity directed upon us in this country, and in great measure an unkind, a malicious curiosity. If there ever was a time when one priest will be a spectacle to men and angels it is in the age now opening upon us.

How appropriate to these dark days of scandal, cover-up and denial, reaching to the very highest ranks of our priests and bishops!

But if Blessed Newman only foresaw the problems ahead, he would not be so important a model and sage for our present day, without also leading us to reform and renewal. This he did, especially in his devotion to faithful Catholic education—a key means of evangelization in a highly secular age.

In The Idea of a University and his other writings, Newman shows his conviction that authentic education ultimately leads one to the fount of Truth, the Creator, and therefore has the same object as theology in each of the ways it teaches knowledge.

Blessed Newman’s very first sermon in his university church in Dublin is particularly helpful. He recalled mankind’s creation, when by grace all the human faculties acted “in common towards one end.” But because of the fall of Adam and Eve, Newman argued, the young person has “all these separate powers warring in his own breast—appetite, passion, secular ambition, intellect, and conscience, and trying severally to get possession of him.”

The object of the Church in promoting Catholic education, then, “it is to reunite things which were in the beginning joined together by God, and have been put asunder by man.”

How much today has been put asunder, causing great confusion and even dissent among our young people?

Newman is often wrongly portrayed as emphasizing the intellectual purposes of education over the religious aspects. Quite the contrary, Newman viewed his role as rector of a Catholic university, above all, as a pastoral duty. He wrote in his journal this prayer for his students:

May I engage in them, remembering that I am a minister of Christ… remembering the worth of souls and that I shall have to answer for the opportunities given me of benefitting those who are under my care.

It is this sort of educator, this sort of education, this sort of pastoral care, that offers the promise of improving and correcting a society that neglects Truth and has turned against Faith.

Newman was certainly correct about the immense challenges facing the Church in a secular society. Nevertheless, he also knew how the battle ends. We know, too.

We look with hope to Blessed John Henry Newman’s eventual canonization, knowing that he can be a powerful patron for the renewal of Catholic education and the whole Church.

This article was first published at The National Catholic Register.

apple on desks

3 Eye-Opening Lessons for Catholics under Common Core

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It’s been five years since controversy peaked over the Common Core State Standards and their use in Catholic schools. What have we learned?

By 2013 the Common Core was being adopted rapidly by Catholic schools and dioceses across the country, prompting deep concern among Catholic families. The Cardinal Newman Society launched its Catholic Is Our Core initiative to press for authentically Catholic standards. Urgent meetings with Catholic education leaders and bishops were convened to explain why the Common Core was the wrong approach for Catholic schools.

Thanks be to God, shortly thereafter the U.S. bishops’ conference advised dioceses to “review, study, consultation, discussion and caution,” noting that the Common Core was “incomplete” and not designed for Catholic schools.

Today, many dioceses have moved toward genuinely Catholic standards for their schools, but the Common Core has never been fully rooted out of Catholic education. It continues to impact testing, curriculum, and textbooks in many dioceses—although the impact varies and is never quite clear.

While the experience has been messy, hopefully it has given new insight to Catholics and Church leaders and reminded educators of the primary mission of Catholic education. Here are three key lessons that have emerged:

1. The Common Core seems unable to live up to its promises.

National test data suggest that the Common Core has failed thus far to live up to its promise of strengthening student achievement in math and language arts, even in public schools.

In an analysis of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) published this week by Denise Donohue, deputy director of K-12 education programs for the Cardinal Newman Society, she finds, “Neither public nor Catholic schools experienced the upswing that was promised by the authors of the Common Core Standards.”

Public school scores from 2009 (pre-CCSS) to 2017 (post-CCSS) are relatively the same and are categorized in the “basic” range on the academic standards scale for the NAEP, whereas Catholic school 8th grade math scores have slid three points in the pre-test/post-test scenario (297 in 2009 to 294 in 2017). Interestingly, the cut-off for “proficient” according to the NAEP literature is a score of 299, leaving Catholic schools that much more to attain before reaching the mark. Meanwhile, the opportunity costs are unknown. Perhaps Catholic schools’ 8th grade math and reading scores might have continued their positive upward trend before the onset of the CCSS.

The U.S. Education Department’s NAEP, Donohue observes, has never been re-aligned to the Common Core like many state tests, so it is a good measure of pre- and post-Common Core achievement. International benchmarking tests also indicate that American students have not made any substantial progress relative to other nations, Donohue finds.

2. Catholic education needs Catholic standards.

Aside from the impact of the Common Core on secular education, the standards are simply wrong for Catholic schools. As the U.S. bishops conference declared in 2014:

Catholic schools must consider standards that support the mission and purpose of the school as a Catholic institution. Attempts to compartmentalize the religious and the secular in Catholic schools reflect a relativistic perspective by suggesting that faith is merely a private matter and does not have a significant bearing on how reality as a whole should be understood. Such attempts are at odds with the integral approach to education that is a hallmark of Catholic schools. Standards that support an appropriate integration should be encouraged.

The Common Core controversy helped many Catholics become aware that dioceses around the country had been relying heavily on secular state standards for many years. That is how the Common Core was initially adopted by Catholic schools without due caution and analysis. When the standards were adopted by states, dioceses quickly and voluntarily followed suit.

Now there is a greater realization that authentically Catholic standards are needed. Many dioceses have made great progress in this direction, such as the Diocese of Grand Rapids and the Diocese of Venice, which both work from the faithful Catholic Curriculum Standards published in 2016 to provide Catholic schools with an alternative.

3. Parents are the primary educators.

Many national, state and local organizations produced important analyses of the Common Core that ultimately halted its spread in Catholic schools. But it was parents who had the most important and influential voice—some voting with their feet and turning to independent Catholic schools and homeschooling.

The Common Core experience has helped remind Catholic bishops, educators and even families that parents are the first educators of their children. Catholic education serves the needs of families in educating and forming children, or it is not Catholic education at all.

Canon law states, “Catholic parents also have the duty and right of choosing those means and institutions through which they can provide more suitably for the Catholic education of their children, according to local circumstances.” If local Catholic schools aren’t enthusiastically and fully providing a truly Catholic education, parents are fully within their rights, and may have a duty, to find better, more faithful options for their children.

As Catholic school enrollment continues to decline, the Church urgently needs to renew the Catholic identity of Catholic schools to support only those that serve parents and the mission of the Church well.

For their part, parents should continue to find their voice and explain to their pastors what genuinely helps them form children for sainthood. This does not include secular fads such as the Common Core.

T This article first appeared at The National Catholic Register.

On Receipt of the Lumen Vitae Medal

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Address to Award Dinner at University of Mary, Bismarck, N.D.
Given October 23, 2018

One of the many reasons I appreciate this award is that it provides a welcome opportunity to consider all of God’s blessings to me and The Cardinal Newman Society over 25 years. Although it’s the Newman Society’s 25th anniversary, we haven’t had much time to celebrate. So, this is our celebration.

And I can’t think of a better way to celebrate than with our good friends at the University of Mary. What the University of Mary has achieved in recent years is incredible, and the Newman Society has been compelled not only to recognize this success but to promote it to Catholic families across the country. The University of Mary today is an inspiring example for the renewal of faithful Catholic education and a beacon of light in the otherwise dark landscape of Catholic higher education that has been largely secularized.

Our patron, Blessed John Henry Newman, was ultimately unable to see his splendid “idea” of an authentic Catholic university come to fruition in Dublin. But Msgr. Shea, leaders, and faculty of the University of Mary, you are truly building it right here in Bismarck!

In my 25 years with The Cardinal Newman Society, I have seen God bring about wonderful improvements in Catholic education. It’s so exciting! Several of the colleges that we recommend in our Newman Guide today weren’t in the initial guide more than a decade ago. Today the Newman Guide colleges are the gold standard for families seeking faithful Catholic education, and many Newman Guide colleges enjoyed record enrollment numbers this year, despite the fact that other private colleges around the country had a very tough year.

There is good news also in Catholic elementary and secondary education. While many parochial and diocesan schools are still closing, many of the schools that have a strong focus on mission and intentionally form saints have done very well. You’ll find many of these schools on our Catholic Education Honor Roll. Catholic homeschoolers and lay-led independent schools continue to increase. Their devotion to Christian formation and their ability to test both classical and innovative methods of teaching have been a boon to the Church. The widespread adoption of the Common Core in Catholic schools, which the Newman Society opposed, opened many eyes to the flawed practice of simply adopting secular state standards to guide Catholic education. Now the Newman Society’s Catholic Curriculum Standards are being used by 20 dioceses and other Catholic schools serving more than a quarter million students.

So in the past 25 years, God has truly blessed the renewal of Catholic education. And for The Cardinal Newman Society specifically, I am so grateful for all the marvelous ways God has brought such good out of our humble work.

I am sure that Monsignor Shea can attest to the many times a new idea or program begins with a stumble, and then God does such incredible things with it. It’s happened to the Newman Society so many times. And that, to me, is what this Lumen Vitae Award most importantly honors: the Grace of God, and what He has wrought through our service to Him.

That service depends heavily on some quite amazing people who advise me on our board of directors and those on my staff who do the work I’m not qualified to do. Two of them—Tom Mead and Cindy Laird—have been with me for well over a decade and during the Newman Society’s most productive years. Two of my other staff heroes are here tonight: our Vice President Bob Laird and his wife Gerri Laird, both of whom have done enormous work for the Newman Society in a variety of roles—and they have done so much for the Church in other ways as well. There are others back in Virginia, Florida, North Carolina, and elsewhere,  who helped carry the Newman Society through these 25 years and also have been great inspirations to me because of their personal example.

Our donors, too, have been such a blessing, and not only for the obvious reason that their generosity is incredibly important to the Newman Society’s success. Even more, I’ve met many of them from all walks of life, and universally they have impressed me by their extraordinary goodness and devotion to the Church. They have been role models for my own personal and spiritual growth. That couldn’t be more true than it is of Deacon George and Marilyn Loegering, whose presence here tonight is yet one more demonstration of their kindness and friendship for so many years. Thank you!

It is also certainly true of the many educators with whom we work closely, including Monsignor Shea and several others among you here at the University of Mary. These are some of the most impressive people I know. I thank God for raising up such devoted and faithful educators.

Last but most, there are some people here who made a long trip because they love me and care for me so much, and I have depended on them for strength every day. My mother Mary Kay is here, and I know that my dad is here also in spirit. They gave so much of themselves for my own formation, and they were and always will be my models of Catholic education.

And my wife Rosario, teacher to my children and the light in my crazy life: her extraordinary insight about Catholic education and her example in founding and persevering with the Aquinas Learning hybrid program shapes my work with the Newman Society in every way. God has also wrought great things from her work. She has been with me and the Newman Society since its earliest days.

And my kids—Ana, Daniel, Nicholas, Joseph, and one more, Ian, who couldn’t be here—I am so proud of them and what they have taught me and their mom, even as we have tried to teach them.

So, you can see that God has surrounded me with magnificent people, which makes it difficult to fail. When Monsignor Shea offered me the Lumen Vitae award for my work with The Cardinal Newman Society, I was overwhelmed as always by the generosity and encouragement that he and the University of Mary have shown for our work to renew faithful Catholic education. But I asked his permission if I might at least verbally share this award with all those by whom God has brought about The Cardinal Newman Society’s 25 years of success.

And so I do want all those I mentioned to share in it, because you are such an important part of this work.

I don’t want to speak too long, but given these times we live in, I want to just add some brief observations concerning scandal and Catholic education’s response to it.

Jesus said that His own generation was an “evil generation.” But we too have come through such an awful year for the Church. I have found myself at times having difficulty working, because the bad news was flooding in so fast, and the betrayal by many of our priests and bishops is so depressing.

The Youth Synod this month was also disappointing. It exposed an astonishing lack of confidence among some Church leaders in the ability of the Church to teach the Faith to our young people. This lack of confidence in the teaching mission of the Church among perhaps most Catholic adults today is, in itself, a scandal to the young.

Scandal, of course, is nothing new to The Cardinal Newman Society. I founded the organization based on my own experience at a large Jesuit university. As editor of the student newspaper, I wrote about the scandals, eventually getting the attention of the local Cardinal. When a university official locked me out of the student newspaper office, I sent letters to top alumni donors, forcing the university to end its support of two radical student organizations.

A few years later, in Washington, D.C., I met several other young Catholics who felt the same anger and betrayal that I experienced, because of similar scandals at their Catholic colleges. But we didn’t lack confidence or hope in the Church, and we weren’t content to leave other young people in harm’s way. Instead, we worked together to establish The Cardinal Newman Society.

My point is that scandal deserves a bold and confident response. I was raised in the Saint John Paul II generation, and I take to heart his reminder of Jesus’ words, “Be not afraid!” Today’s scandals in the Church may be different in kind from what we experienced at wayward Catholic colleges. But still, I believe the response must be the same: a strong show of confidence in the Church that Christ established, and a renewed effort to propose and defend her teachings. A faithful Catholic university like the University of Mary can play a significant role in that.

Indeed, I would say that faithful Catholic education is the key solution to the challenges facing the Church. We need new generations of wise and virtuous Catholics who know and love Jesus in the Faith and traditions of His Church.  We need them to renew the priesthood, renew the Church, and renew the culture.

But to get there, we adults can’t lack confidence in the truth of Christ’s teaching.

We can’t lack confidence in the role of parents as primary educators of their children.

We can’t lack confidence in Christ’s promise that the Church will prevail.

And we can’t lack confidence that God will reward those who stand firmly in the Faith.

On the other hand, we can’t doubt Christ’s words, that he who scandalizes young people would be better off “if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.” Believe it! And if we believe it, then we will stand as adults should and protect our young people from the harm that seems to await them on all sides.

Faithful Catholic education is the strength and the shield that we need to provide them. Forming them in both truth and love – in the skills of reasoning and the knowledge of Christ – is what young people need today to resist temptation to hopelessness and relativism.

If young Catholics cannot think reasonably, they will be unable to withstand the lies that our secular culture feeds them. Catholic education must return to its emphasis on forming the minds of young people, not just filling their heads with information.

But even more, Catholic education must lead young people to Christ. We must understand formation in the Catholic school or college as guiding young people into sainthood.

I am reminded of the 12th-century dispute between St. Bernard of Clairvaux and Peter Abelard, just as the first modern universities were on the rise. St. Bernard championed a “theology of the heart” that sought understanding of God not by reason but by prayer and adoration. Peter Abelard was an early scholastic who sought understanding of God by using reason to study the truths of the Faith. It was Abelard’s approach and the wisdom of scholastics like Thomas Aquinas that gave prominence to the great Catholic universities.

But can we claim that reason remains truly central to education today at many universities? Are young people prepared to recognize and understand truth? A Catholic school or college that truly forms young people in reason is a gift that our Church and culture sorely need today.

Still, Pope Benedict XVI warned American Catholic educators in 2008 that the “contemporary crisis of truth” which so deeply affects our young people is, at its heart, a “crisis of faith.”[1] In the 12th century, St. Bernard warned that there is “grave danger” in becoming too focused on reason in matters of faith. The result, he said, would be “intellectualism, the relativizing of truth, and the questioning of the truths of faith themselves.”[2]

Isn’t that an apt description of much of what ails Catholic education today? The irony is that while we do suffer these consequences, it can’t be because there is too much emphasis on rationality in our Catholic schools and colleges; if anything, reason is lacking. Instead, we find ourselves in an odd time when universities still lay claim to being the intellectual centers of our culture—and indeed there may still be valuable and reasoned dialogue among bright lights on college faculties—but young people are not being formed to carry on the conversation. At the same time, under the guise of rationality, God Himself is excluded.

Saint John Paul II said that “a Catholic university’s privileged task is ‘to unite existentially by intellectual effort two orders of reality that too frequently tend to be placed in opposition as though they were antithetical: the search for truth, and the certainty of already knowing the fount of truth’.”[3] Rediscovering the fount or source of truth in God, as well as recommitting to the scholastic ideal of rational exploration of our Faith with skilled reasoning and complete fidelity to the Church, are essential to the renewal of Catholic education.

Seeing this renewal play out at exceptional institutions like the University of Mary is, for me, the greatest gift after 25 years of promoting and defending faithful Catholic education. I see in the University’s leaders true love and devotion for God, and understanding that He is the source of wisdom and all reality. From that foundation, a great Catholic university is built.

I was thrilled to see on the University of Mary website a quote from Blessed John Henry Newman that I have cited many times, and it is as fitting now as ever to conclude with this thought:

“This is our hour, whatever be its duration: the hour for great hopes, great schemes, great efforts, great beginnings. We may live indeed to see but little built, but we shall see much founded. A new era seems to be at hand, and a bolder policy is showing itself… to recommence the Age of Universities.”[4]

[1] Pope Benedict XVI, “Address to Catholic Educators at The Catholic University of America” (Washington, D.C., April 17, 2008); retrieved from http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2008/april/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20080417_cath-univ-washington.html

[2] Pope Benedict XVI, General Audience (Vatican, Nov. 4, 2009); retrieved from https://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2009/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20091104.html

[3] Pope Saint John Paul II, Ex corde Ecclesiae (Vatican, 1990), 1; retrieved from http://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_jp-ii_apc_15081990_ex-corde-ecclesiae.html

[4] Newman, Historical Sketches: Volume III, 251.

girl in chair reading

Arlington Bishop to Homeschooling Families: “Thank You”

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An American bishop stood strong last week in support of Catholic homeschoolers, just days after some bishops at the Youth Synod in Rome reported comments that were offensive to homeschool parents.

On Friday, Bishop Michael Burbidge of the Diocese of Arlington celebrated his second annual Mass for homeschooling families. The Diocese reported “hundreds” in attendance.

“Dear parents thank you so much for taking seriously that responsibility of being the first teachers of the faith,” Bishop Burbidge said during his homily at Holy Trinity Church in Gainesville, Virginia, according to the Arlington Catholic Herald.

His words were especially welcome, after an unnamed group of English-speaking bishops at the Youth Synod questioned in their interim report on Oct. 9 whether parents are “qualified” to teach their children. The bishops claimed an “ideological basis” to homeschooling and noted that the U.S. bishops are “not united” in support of the practice.

Bishop Burbidge, however, clearly sees how important homeschooling has been to Catholic families in his diocese. More from Saturday’s article in the Herald:

“You may not always see the visible and immediate results that you want as homeschool teachers, but you can be assured that the seeds you are planting God will use miraculously. Thank you for the gift you are to the diocese and to our church,” Bishop Burbidge said.

Throughout the day, organizers of the event and parents expressed their gratitude for his presence.

“It really shows the commitment of the bishop to Catholic education. Whether it is in the schools or in recognizing the importance of the homeschooling community, in both ways he supports parents as the primary educators of their children,” said Diocesan Superintendent of Schools Jennifer Bigelow.

Mary Beth Balint, a homeschooling parent of six children, was thrilled about the Mass, too.

“I was so excited that Bishop Burbidge wanted to offer a Mass for homeschoolers,” said Balint, a key organizer for this year’s event as well as last year’s. “It is just great to have the support and prayers from him. I was eager to jump in and help organize the outdoor activities for the kids after the Mass.”

The support shown by Bishop Burbidge and other bishops holding similar events is a great encouragement to Catholic homeschoolers, who can feel disconnected and even disliked by priests and fellow parishioners. Bishop Burbidge also celebrated an annual homeschool Mass while bishop of Raleigh, North Carolina.

Hopefully such expressions of support are just the beginning of a healthier perspective on Catholic education. While the renewal of faithful parochial and diocesan schools should be among the highest priorities for the Church, so should the growth of Catholic homeschooling and lay-run independent schools that teach the Catholic faith. A corporate mindset that sees these alternatives as competition with the diocesan “brand” is not looking out for the needs of all Catholic families.

When every bishop and diocesan education office actively supports all forms of faithful Catholic education and withdraws support and recognition from institutions that fail to form young people in virtue and faith, we can expect a renewal of Catholic education, the family and the Church.

“Parents are the first and most important educators of their own children, and they also possess a fundamental competence in this area: they are educators because they are parents,” affirmed Saint John Paul II in his Letter to Families. God has blessed homeschooling in many ways, and I pray that it continues to gain the support of the Church’s shepherds.

This article was first posted at The National Catholic Register.

Homeschooling mom and child

Synod Report Displays Ignorance About Homeschooling

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At the Youth Synod in Rome this week, one of the bishops’ discussion groups made some disappointing and ignorant comments about Catholic homeschoolers.

It’s a sad reminder that, while homeschooling seems to be gaining support from many bishops in the United States, other bishops here and abroad have yet to embrace one of the most promising developments in the Church today. Earnest and faithful homeschooling parents deserve encouragement and not derision from their shepherds.

The report from the English-language Group C bishops—whose names have not been published—reads:

  • USA has many home schoolers – bishops in USA are not united, as homeschooling can have an ideological basis – kids may have special needs
  • are parents qualified to homeschool them?

It is certainly true that the American bishops are not united in supporting homeschooling, and that is a shame. But what’s the “ideological basis” for homeschooling? Do the bishops perceive some absolute opposition to organized education? It’s not true; many homeschooled students have, at one time or another, attended schools or participated in collaborative programs.

More likely, Group C’s “ideological” comment means something else. It’s what faithful Catholic homeschoolers endure frequently from fellow Catholics, priests and even bishops—the charge that they are too “conservative” and too “moralistic.”

In my experience, those are code words for simply being faithful—for practicing the “old” ways of prayer, sacrament and moral discipline.

As a father of five homeschooled children, teacher at a weekly hybrid Catholic program for homeschoolers that is directed by my wife, and full-time advocate of faithful Catholic education, I have come to know hundreds of Catholic homeschooling families. They are trying to be faithfully Catholic in all that they do. And a key reason for not attending local Catholic schools, aside from the cost, is that too many of the schools lack strong moral and religious formation.

That’s not ideological. It’s responsible Catholic parenting.

In my homeschool community—and in the growing number of parochial, diocesan and lay-run, independent Catholic schools that have embraced the Church’s vision for Catholic education—I see primarily parents who are deeply concerned for the Christian formation of their children. They make great sacrifices to provide the education that their children deserve. And they do so, despite the often demoralizing sneers and snickers of too many in the Church.

As for the Synod bishops’ question whether parents are “qualified to homeschool” their children, it’s not clear whether the question refers to all children or only those with “special needs.” Regardless, the question shows disrespect toward parents. Every parent who is faithfully Catholic and truly loves their child is “qualified” to homeschool by the grace of God. If they lack certain skills or expertise, a loving parent will get the help their child needs, without yielding parental authority and oversight.

Trusting parents to form and care for their children is Catholic teaching! It is inherent to matrimony, reinforced during child baptism, and follows from the Fourth Commandment. And it can be made easier if parishes and dioceses actively support—not control or direct, but support—parents who choose to homeschool.

God has clearly blessed Catholic homeschooling with extraordinary results for children, families and the Church. The academic, financial, and social benefits of homeschooling have been well-documented in many studies. Moreover, homeschooled families are often represented at daily Mass, regular Sunday Mass, Confession, Eucharistic adoration and many parish activities. One recent study found that homeschooled students account for about 10 percent of priestly vocations today.

This isn’t a well-kept secret! But some of the Synod bishops have some learning to do.

Meanwhile, if America’s bishops and other Catholics are truly divided over homeschooling, then they ought to get over their discomfort. The Church should embrace faithful Catholic education in whatever form successfully leads young people to Christ and helps them become fully human—whether at home, online or in a brick-and-mortar school.

Support for homeschooling and for lay-run schools may be new to dioceses that have historically relied on schools owned and directed by priests and bishops. But we can’t confuse method for mission, which is amply served by the growing alternatives in Catholic education. All we need is to trust parents to do the job that God has already entrusted to them.

This article first appeared at The National Catholic Register.

Youth Synod Needs Good News from Faithful Catholic Colleges

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October’s Synod on Young People comes amid growing awareness of the Catholic Church’s many failures to teach, inspire, and even protect its young. But if the synod fathers are looking for good news, there’s plenty to be found at America’s most faithful Catholic colleges—and these can be examples for the entire Church.

Papal biographer and columnist George Weigel recently urged that “Success stories in youth ministry should be persistently, even relentlessly, lifted up” at the synod. He specifically noted the “intellectual and spiritual achievements of orthodox, academically vibrant Catholic liberal arts colleges and universities in the United States.”

As editor of The Newman Guide, I couldn’t agree more! The faithful Catholic colleges recommended by The Cardinal Newman Society are accomplishing much, for the good of their students and for the Church. And since the mission of the Church is evangelization, and Catholic education is a key means of evangelization, it would only make sense that faithful Catholic colleges would be held up as examples for the Synod on Young People.

Just recently, the U.S. News and World Report rankings were released, and many Newman Guide colleges earned high marks in various categories. But more important than secular rankings, faithful education help provide the formation that young Catholics deserve and which is lacking across much of the Church today.

This formation is offered through faithful theology courses, strong liberal arts core curricula, the witness of faithful leaders on campus, the focus on reverent liturgy and prayer, a healthy campus culture, athletic programs that encourage virtue, and so much more.

Dr. John Grabowski, associate professor of moral theology and ethics at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., explains that studying philosophy and theology “enables the young adult to ‘own’ the faith which their parents, priests, and other teachers had passed on to them.” He recalls, “One of the most rewarding and humbling things that has occurred in my years of teaching is to have students enter the Church or come back to the faith after taking a class and tell me that the course helped them to make that decision.”

That’s a far cry from the scandal and confusion sown by wayward Catholic colleges, such as those that hosted seminars earlier this year on Amoris Laetitia with theologians who are well-known for their attempts to change the Church’s teaching and traditions.

The core curriculum and faculty at a faithful Catholic college are focused on a student’s formation in the light of faith, not in opposition to it. “All students, Catholic and non-Catholic, deserve an education that awakens wonder and is oriented to an integrated wisdom, both theoretical and practical,” says Dr. Josh Hochschild, professor of philosophy at Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Maryland. A strong curriculum is “crucial to help students experience the unity of truth,” he says, but just as important is “the character of the faculty.”

“In any discipline, faculty can help embody confidence and humility of the pursuit of truth, and the example of Christian witness in faculty is a profound grace to students,” Hochschild explains. “The whole campus culture has a role in supporting this vision.”

The faithful colleges held up for example in The Newman Guide often go above and beyond to ensure that students have good role models on campus. Steve Minnis, president of Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas, told us: “I interview every job applicant on campus, and I ask them to explain to me how they see themselves contributing to our mission—not just accept that we have a mission, but how they will support it. I want every man or woman who works for Benedictine College to be someone I hope our students will aspire to be like.”

Another thing that is at the heart of a faithful Catholic college is the liturgy, which is something that George Harne, president of Northeast Catholic College in Warner, New Hampshire, has often emphasized. And when asked how the College is forming young people in the truth of our faith, several students noted the liturgical life on campus.

Sophomore Rose Phelps says, “Most importantly, the way the liturgy is celebrated at NCC has truly helped me deepen my relationship with God. The reverence of the priests and altar servers along with the beautiful chant and polyphony music make it so easy to lift ones heart to God.”

Senior Rebecca Stolarski agrees. “The spiritual resources available to students [on campus]—daily Mass, Rosary, Adoration, Confession—should not be underestimated: there are few things more spiritual restorative than an evening before the Blessed Sacrament, and nothing more strengthening to faith than convenient access to daily Mass.”

Faithful colleges attend to the entire campus culture. Some great examples are the wholesome activities offered through the outdoor adventures program at Wyoming Catholic College, the Rome campus program offered through the University of Dallas, and the “household” systems at Ave Maria University and Franciscan University of Steubenville that invite groups of students to live and pray together. Benedictine College’s Minnis says the key is to make it “contagious to live the good life” and to let the “good things run wild.”

Formation extends into the realm of athletics. At Belmont Abbey College in Belmont, North Carolina, President Bill Thierfelder is a former Olympian who stresses virtue in all athletic programs. It’s no surprise that student athletes have helped the College earn the sportsmanship award from its Division II athletics conference in four of the last seven years.

All areas on campus should help form students, according to Michael McMahon, vice president for enrollment management at the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota “Through academics, residence life, and even athletics—all seeking truth, students understand that truth is not disjointed or that our lives can be compartmentalized,” he says. “If it is true in the theology course, it needs to also be true in the residence life halls. If the faculty and administration of a university are not faithful to the Church’s teachings why would our students be inspired to be?”

Joseph Nemec, a junior at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas, says, “I am grateful to God for the opportunity to study at an institution that values the very things young people want and need.”

Often when parents and students think of college, they think of education. But an education at a faithful Catholic college is about so much more: it’s about formation. This formation shapes a student’s body, mind, and soul and prepares a student for his or her vocation, as well as a career.

The impact of faithful Catholic colleges is impressive! In just 40 years with an enrollment of 500 students, Christendom College in Front Royal, Virginia, has helped foster 158 religious vocations. Additionally, there have been 419 alumna-to-alumnus marriages. Thomas Aquinas College in Santa Paula, California, was once asked by the Vatican’s Congregation for Catholic Education to give an account for why so many priestly and religious vocations come from the College.

Maybe it’s time for the Synod on Young People to ask Newman Guide colleges to give an account for their success in youth formation. These joyfully Catholic institutions provide an example of fidelity and success that can be a shining light to anyone who is trying to bring Christ to new generations.

This article was originally published by National Catholic Register.