Almost half of U.S. Catholics want the Church to recognize same-sex unions, according to the Pew Research Center. A majority support administering the Eucharist to cohabiting couples and divorced/remarried Catholics without an annulment.
These views differ sharply with the Church’s clear teaching on marriage, and we see similar confusion and disagreement among Catholics and in society at large over moral behaviors concerning gender, abortion, dress, language and more. It is not only a matter of disagreement with Catholic doctrine, but actual immoral practices and disintegration of the family.
For Catholic schools, this makes the admissions process all the more difficult. Some families today who seek enrollment in Catholic schools are deeply wounded or confused about marriage, parenting and human sexuality as God intends. Are they a good fit for Catholic schools?
Seeking God’s plan
Most of today’s parents grew up in a post-“sexual revolution” world, where the media have relentlessly promoted values and behaviors at odds with Catholic teaching. Even many Catholic parents are either unaware of a Catholic understanding in these areas or have dismissed or rejected them. Students are also suffering with deep confusion, with media messages telling them there are numerous gender identities and that feelings can trump their biology.
In all cases, Catholic schools must handle each case in a sensitive and charitable manner while maintaining faithfulness to Church teaching. In working with nontraditional or wounded families, educators should listen and seek to understand their complexities and limitations. Schools should not underestimate the time, compassion and resources this worthwhile outreach will require or assume that the school is the best or only vehicle for evangelization in such cases.
Keep in mind that nontraditional families are not burdens, but beloved children of a God who loves them intimately and has a plan of growth, healing or conversion for them. During the admissions process, Catholic schools can facilitate the conversation around that divine plan. It may include delaying or denying enrollment if certain behaviors pose a threat to the school’s religious mission or cause confusion and scandal. The expectation and right of enrolled students to receive formation that leads them to God—and not away from Him—takes priority over admitting a problematic new student.
Not every school has the capacity to sufficiently address the needs of children or their family members who desire enrollment in the school. Some families must be turned toward other alternatives for education, either because their views of life’s ultimate purpose and end are at odds with those of the Church, or because their example would lead others to sin. Such families might benefit from other forms of Catholic education, including homeschooling and parish catechetical instruction, that avoid some of the demands of a formal school community.
For instance, an atheistic family who vocalizes faith that a theistic God is a sham, or a family heavily into the occult or New Age religion. Admitting others who actively and publicly engage in cohabitation, polygamy, incest, or homosexual activity might be seen as condoning this type of behavior. The school must see that its religious mission of moral formation and evangelization is not publicly compromised, hindered or undone by significantly off-mission families.
Admitting such families might create mixed messages for the admitted student and others who are unable to rectify this cognitive dissonance. At some point, the school will teach a message opposite what the students are experiencing: that true Christian marriage is between one man and one woman, that God does in fact exist, that there are only two biological sexes, and so on. This will inevitably cause older children to question the actions of their adult family members or their teacher, pitting one against the other and creating skepticism of the teachings of the faith or distrust to authority in the minds and hearts of the students.
Many cases of nontraditional families (families other than a married couple of one man and one woman validly married in the Church) can be corrected through catechesis in the faith, such as for those who have a nascent understanding of Church teaching or those who come from a non-Catholic Christian background or other faith-based tradition. Cohabitating couples or parents who are divorced and remarried outside the Church have ways of correcting and regularizing their relationships.
Those Catholic families who struggle significantly with the acceptance of elements of Catholic faith or morals need the help of their parish priest or staff to discuss areas of conflict or uncertainty and to seek reconciliation with the Church. The integrity of such pastoral intervention is absolutely dependent on pastors and counselors being faithful to Catholic teaching and working closely in harmony with the Catholic school administrators and teachers as a cohesive team.
Examples of nontraditional families
Today there is a growing variety of family situations that pose difficulties for Catholic school admissions teams. Some are described briefly below, but I provide a deeper and more nuanced reflection in my paper, “Working with Nontraditional Families in Catholic Schools.”
Family from another faith: Catholic schools will normally welcome non-Catholic families of goodwill who are expressly and affirmatively supportive of the school’s primary Catholic religious mission, with the exception of Satanic, wiccan, occult or other blasphemous behaviors or practices which are serious conflicts with a Catholic school’s mission. Open hostility, public defiance and public challenges against Catholic truths or morality are signs that a family is not a good fit for a school’s primary evangelical mission. Non-Catholic students deserve the same religious instruction as Catholics and attend the same religious services and activities, participating to the extent they are able. Formal or ritual non-Catholic prayer services or activities are inappropriate and may be blasphemous.
Single-parent household: A single-parent household is not normally a barrier to enrolling in a Catholic school. The parent—like all parents—agrees to work in harmony with the school as it teaches the Catholic faith concerning marriage, chastity and divorce and to avoid behaviors which are contrary to Catholic teaching such as sexual promiscuity or adultery.
Cohabiting couple forming a household: A school should refer such couples to the local pastor for counseling and catechesis, in the hope of starting down a path of regularization. A couple may avoid scandal by living in chastity appropriate to their state in life. But if a pastor is aware that a catechized couple refuses to strive for a life of chastity, and in his judgment the couple is unlikely to consider such a move with additional outreach and catechesis, he may need to instruct them against enrolling their student. This is especially necessary if issues of public scandal arise.
Parents divorced and remarried outside the Church: The Church considers a valid marriage to be a permanent union between a man and a woman. Those who have divorced and remarried outside the Church and are reasonably assumed to be sexually active are involved in living an immoral lifestyle. A school may ask the couple to meet with the local parish priest to determine their status and if and how that status might be regularized in the Church, while doing all they can to avoid scandalizing students. If a couple refuses to attempt regularization or is unwilling to strive to meet Church requirements given their marital status, it may be prudent to deny admission.
Same-sex union: This circumstance is not identical to that of other parents in irregular or immoral family situations, which often can be regularized and may be publicly ambiguous. Same-sex couples who advocate and persist in their union actively and publicly model a different morality, present a lived counter-evangelization, and have a different understanding of what Christian integration of the mind, body and spirit looks like. Admitting students from families formed around same-sex unions, therefore, is a certain cause of scandal in Catholic schools and invites moral confusion. The couple is openly engaged in and openly promotes public, unrepentant, objectively disordered behavior, and the school itself can become complicit in confusion and scandal if it generates the appearance of normalcy, since the couple cannot possibly be on a path of regularization.
Student presenting with same-sex attraction: All students are called to chastity, which is the successful integration of sexuality within the person according to their state in life. A Catholic school’s mission is compromised if students are allowed to advocate or celebrate same-sex attraction as a personal positive good in the context of classes, activities or events. The school should not permit identification with such terms as “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual,” or “queer.” During the admissions process, a faithful Catholic school will present students who disclose same-sex attraction the beautiful and liberating teachings of the Catholic Church on God’s design for the human person and human sexuality. These students should, as a condition of enrollment, work with appropriate Church and diocesan offices, ministries and counselors in the hope of living in harmony with Christ’s teachings.
Parent identifying contrary to biological sex: The Catholic school can present such parents with the Church’s teaching about the human person and God’s plan for mankind and agree to this teaching for their children. In particular cases, parents may be directed to the local pastor and other faith-based psychologists and medical personnel, who can work with them to address their gender dysphoria. As a condition of a student’s enrollment, the parent whose sense of sexual identity is compromised agrees not to draw attention to his or her gender incongruence, so as not to confuse or scandalize the students.
Student identifying contrary to biological sex: A faithful Catholic school will inform the student and the student’s parents that the school interacts with all students according to their biological sex, not professed “gender identities.” The family should be willing to work toward integrating the student’s sexual identity with their biological sex, including counseling with their pastor and other trained Catholic medical and psychological professionals who are best able to help them in clarifying and defining issues of self (and sexual) identity in accord with Catholic teaching and God’s natural plan. If the student or parents insist on a name, clothing or behavior that publicly signal gender dysphoria, the student may not be a good fit for the school.
Student conceived by in-vitro fertilization or surrogacy: Children are always a gift from God, no matter the circumstances of their conception. But a parent’s or student’s public and persistent advocacy for these artificial methods of generating life, which undermines the teaching of the Church and the formative efforts of the school, is cause for denying admission.
Seeking true good for families
The challenges facing Catholic schools and the often-wounded families they are called to serve are significant and can almost seem overwhelming. This is a time calling not just for compassion, but also for courage. Courage to fulfill this ministry is required in a culture which may brand such teaching as judgmental or intolerant.
Instead, a faithful Catholic school demonstrates true compassion for nontraditional families. This may involve enrolling a family in a Catholic school, or it may require revoking, denying or delaying enrollment as a family undergoes faith formation and regularization through other Church ministries. In either case, the desire is to meet them where they are and eventually bring them home to full communion with Christ and His Church.
A Year-End Victory for Catholic Education
/in Blog Commentary, Public Policy and Legal (General) Latest, PR Register Column/by Patrick ReillyLast summer, I wrote about the urgency of holding a “crucial line of defense for Catholic education” against false ideology and attacks on Christian morality — and now, a key victory has been won in federal court!
On Dec. 13, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled unanimously that Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, is protected by the First Amendment in its right to uphold religious and moral standards for its members. It agreed with attorneys from the stalwart Becket institute and rejected an appeal by two former students who were dismissed from the seminary for violating agreed-upon standards by entering into civil same-sex marriages.
While the dismissal of two students at a nondenominational seminary may not seem immediately relevant to Catholic schools and colleges, in fact this case threatened to dismantle a crucial protection for religious education. The lawsuit challenged the religious exemption to Title IX, the federal law that bans sex discrimination in education, and the exemption’s availability to schools and colleges that are not directly controlled by a religious sect — as many private Catholic schools and nearly all Catholic colleges are not.
Why should this be important to Catholic educators? Surely they have no issues with preventing sex discrimination? Catholic schools and colleges have eagerly employed women, expanded opportunities for women’s sports and worked to combat sexual harassment and assault.
In fact, victory in this case now empowers Catholic educators to stand firmly in the defense of women and against the irrational demands of gender ideology, which would erode many of the gains made for women under Title IX.
The whole federal effort to prevent sex discrimination was upended in 2020 with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County, which distorts the meaning of “sex discrimination” for purposes of employment law to include homosexuality and self-identified gender, even when it is contrary to one’s biological sex. Although Bostockapplies only to employment law under Title VII, activists and the Biden administration are attempting to conform Title IX to the demands of LGBT ideology.
This only hurts women, by giving biologically male students access to women’s sports competitions and bathrooms. It creates other serious problems for Catholic education by allowing teachers and students to ignore moral standards regarding same-sex marriage and homosexual behavior.
Nevertheless, as long as the robust religious exemption in Title IX stands, religious schools and colleges can uphold their beliefs and protect traditional separations between male and female facilities and athletics. The exemption stands in the way of radical attacks on religious education. That’s why, over the past year, we have seen multiple legislative and legal efforts by activists and the Biden administration to weaken or dismantle the Title IX religious exemption.
One of those now-failed efforts was Maxon v. Fuller Theological Seminary. The plaintiffs seized upon language in the Title IX religious exemption that says an eligible school or college must be “controlled by a religious organization.” Although the U.S. Department of Education has always exempted from Title IX clearly religious institutions that are nondenominational (like Fuller) or legally independent of a religious body (like nearly all Catholic colleges and many Catholic schools), the plaintiffs tried to have these institutions stripped of their religious freedom and forced to comply with the Biden administration’s strange interpretation of sex discrimination.
This would have been devastating for Catholic education. Last June, the Cardinal Newman Society and several faithful Catholic schools and colleges joined with the Christian Legal Society and other religious groups in an amicus briefurging the Ninth Circuit to reject the students’ appeal. Signers included Belmont Abbey College (North Carolina), Benedictine College (Kansas), Franciscan University of Steubenville (Ohio), Lumen Christi High School (Indiana), Marian High School (Indiana), the Regina Academies (Pennsylvania) and Thomas More College of Liberal Arts (New Hampshire).
Other signers representing a variety of beliefs included the American Association of Christian Schools, Association for Biblical Higher Education, Association of Christian Schools International, General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists, Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty, and Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.
“It is dangerous and un-American to deny a share in religious freedom for nondenominational and independent religious institutions,” was my statement to media reporters last summer. “Such a policy would unconstitutionally discriminate against many of America’s religious schools and colleges, including those Catholic schools and colleges that are faithful to their beliefs but legally independent of the Catholic Church.”
The amicus brief called on the Ninth Circuit to recognize that an independent institution controlled by a board of trustees with deeply held religious convictions and a religious mission is sufficiently “controlled by a religious organization” for the purposes of the Title IX exemption.
Praise be to God, the court unanimously agreed. “For over 30 years, DOE [U.S. Department of Education] has maintained that the statute does not contain ‘an independent requirement that the controlling religious organization be a separate legal entity than the educational institution,’” the court noted. It upheld a district court’s ruling in 2020 and found that the plaintiffs “could allege no additional facts to save their challenge to Fuller’s differential treatment of same-sex marriages as compared to opposite-sex marriages, since Fuller’s actions fell squarely within Title IX’s religious exemption.”
Catholic educators and the whole of the Catholic Church received a wonderful gift, by this strong federal ruling for religious freedom. We live in a nation that still celebrates Christmas and allows Catholics to teach young people the truth of Christ — and for that we can be grateful in this merry season.
This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.
Evangelizing Families Through Catholic School Admissions
/in Mission and Governance Admissions and Enrollment, Commentary/by Cardinal Newman Society StaffDon Bosco, one of the Church’s greatest educator saints, welcomed Turin’s poor and delinquent boys to his Oratorio—but only if they committed to receiving Catholic formation and refraining from behavior that would scandalize other students.
Although he was eager to bring the Catholic faith to boys on the peripheries, Bosco nevertheless turned away or dismissed those who would not repent of immoral behavior and presented an ongoing bad influence on others. He was renowned both for his kindness and for his discipline, always with primary concern for the ultimate good of the boys under his care—and even for those who were excluded, with hope for eventual repentance and reconciliation with God.
The oratory’s admissions policy, then, was at once welcoming to all and uncompromising in its expectations. This served the oratory’s primary purpose of evangelization, including care for those who were not yet able to participate constructively in the oratory’s community of faith.
Prioritizing both mission and community is central to The Cardinal Newman Society’s new Policy Standards for Catholic School Admissions, which is being circulated among Church leaders, Catholic educators and admissions experts for comment and further development before final publication early in the year.
Developing such guidance is no easy task. Today’s Catholic schools face much different challenges than those addressed by Saint John Bosco. While he had to contend with sometimes unruly and even criminal youth, today the Church is confronted by widely accepted social norms and ideologies that conflict directly with Catholic moral teachings and even the nature of the human person.
Even so, the broad strokes of Bosco’s approach are relevant as ever. Catholic education is the Church’s most important means of evangelization, forming young people deeply in truth and fidelity to Christ. While not every family is ready to embrace that mission and participate in it—especially in an age of widespread confusion and denial of basic truths about man and God—the admissions process can be a work of charity and mercy for both those who are admitted and those who are not received into the school.
Mission priority
Writing in his memoirs, Don Bosco sketched the outlines of a welcoming and compassionate policy for his oratory. Both a home and a school for needy children, the oratory preserved the core mission of Catholic education:
Especially to be avoided, according to the saint, was anything that might lead students away from God and the truths of the Catholic faith. “Only in matters of scandal let the superior be inexorable,” he wrote. “Better run the risk of sending away an innocent boy than to keep one who is a cause of scandal.”
This concern is echoed in the Newman Society’s admissions standards, principally authored by Dr. Denise Donohue, vice president for educator resources, and Dr. Dan Guernsey, education policy editor and senior fellow.
“Unfortunately, there are situations where unrepentant students or parents provide counter-witness to the Gospel or through their lived example present and model sinful behavior as a good to be supported and pursued,” they write. “In such cases, the school must ask them to make other arrangements for their academic education due to the negative impact on the school and encourage them to work with other Church ministries as they strive to bring their lives in accord with God’s plan.”
These hard cases are carefully considered in the Newman Society’s two issue bulletins, “Not All Families Are a Good Fit for Catholic Schools” and “Working with Nontraditional Families in Catholic Schools.” Both are summarized by Dr. Guernsey in this linked article.
Beyond moral concerns, there are financial and other practical reasons why Catholic schools cannot accommodate every student, despite sincere efforts. “The Church needs to ensure robust evangelization programs for parish children not able to attend Catholic schools,” write Donohue and Guernsey, recognizing that every child deserves formation in the faith, and many need help filling the gaps and correcting the falsehoods in public education.
Community teaching communion
Our admissions standards conform to several broad principles that should govern admissions policies in Catholic schools, beginning with a concern for the school community. While other Catholic education programs may have similar goals and principles, the formal Catholic school is distinct in the amount of time students spend together and the impact of parent and peer behavior on students.
“Because its aim is to make man more man, education can be carried out authentically only in a relational and community context,” the Vatican teaches in the 2007 document, Educating Together in Catholic Schools. “It is not by chance that the first and original educational environment is that of the natural community of the family. Schools, in their turn, take their place beside the family as an educational space that is communitarian, organic and intentional, and they sustain their educational commitment, according to a logic of assistance.”
Catholic education’s mission is, in part, to form young people for community life—for communion with each other and with God. Learning Christian communion requires the good example of others, and bad behavior can directly impact the education of all students in the community. The Vatican therefore describes Catholic education as “educating in communion and for communion.”
“The Catholic school, characterized mainly as an educating community, is a school for the person and of persons,” explains Educating Together. “In fact, it aims at forming the person in the integral unity of his being, using the tools of teaching and learning where ‘criteria of judgment, determining values, points of interest, lines of thought, sources of inspiration and models of life’ are formed.”
Thus, it is important that the Catholic school community be a genuine Christian community. This does not mean that every member must be Christian or entirely free of sin, but all members of the school community are “harmonized by truth” and the “Christian vision of reality,” according to the Newman Society standards. “When Catholic values animate the environment, vision and moral purpose flourish.”
The Vatican’s 1988 document, The Religious Dimension of Education in a Catholic School, cites conditions necessary to foster and sustain this culture of communion: “that everyone agree with the educational goals and cooperate in achieving them; that interpersonal relationships be based on love and Christian freedom; that each individual, in daily life, be a witness to Gospel values; that every student be challenged to strive for the highest possible level of formation, both human and Christian.”
Other Church documents on catechesis and education also articulate the importance of a strong faith-based community, where reference to Catholic traditions and beliefs and frequent reception of the sacraments are the norm. These practices help form young students and reinforce for older ones the perpetual need to ground their spiritual journey in the deep well of abiding wisdom, grace and mercy found in the Catholic Church.
The Directory for Catechesis teaches that “The Christian community is the primary agent of catechesis,” and “paying attention to group relationships has a pedagogical significance: it develops the sense of belonging to the Church and assists growth in the faith.” Children learn from those peers and adults who surround them.
Ultimately, a healthy admissions process benefits all concerned, by ensuring a nurturing community, preserving the Catholic school’s mission of evangelization and helping families connect with schools that best serve their needs and interests. With these goals, a Catholic school can proceed confidently with clarity and consistency.
Wyoming Catholic College Graduates Help Others Experience ‘God’s First Book’
/in Blog Newman Guide Articles, Profiles in FCE/by Veronica NygaardFor a young adult used to spending time in a classroom or online, encountering God’s grandeur in the mountains of Wyoming can be a profound spiritual experience. Now graduates of Wyoming Catholic College in Lander, Wyo., are sharing what they experienced with others through an exciting outdoor retreat program.
In Sacred Scripture, mountains are often places of prayer and encounters with God. Abraham was called to sacrifice his only son on a mountain—but then had a profound experience of God when He commanded him not to complete the sacrifice. Moses received the Ten Commandments and spoke with God on Mt. Sinai. Elijah heard God’s still, small voice on a mountain. Jesus often went to the mountains to pray by Himself. Throughout the Scriptures, we see again and again how God can be discovered in the wilderness and on the mountaintops.
Students at Wyoming Catholic College, which is recommended for its faithful Catholic education in The Newman Guide, encounter God in the wilderness and on the mountaintops through a rigorous outdoor program. Students explore the wilderness, or “God’s First Book,” to find Him and renew their relationship with Him while backpacking, whitewater kayaking and ice climbing. It’s more than just having a good time in the wilderness—it’s about education, communication, preparedness, leadership, and growing closer to God.
Zachary Carlstrom, who graduated from WCC in 2016, had a profound encounter with God during his 21-day freshman expedition, which is the College’s freshman orientation trip in the Wind River Mountains. Never in his wildest dreams did he think that, years later, he would be operating COR Expeditions (Catholic Outdoor Retreat), which is an outreach of WCC, alongside his wife Sarah, a 2014 graduate. Today, the two are using the education and formation they received at WCC to help others encounter God through nature.
COR “facilitates transformative encounters with Christ through what the wilderness has to offer,” according to the Carlstroms, and gives those who haven’t attended WCC a taste of the College’s outdoor program.
In 2012, a few ministry-focused organizations and seminaries started asking WCC to facilitate trips for them and their students, because they could see the benefits of outdoor education. “We wanted to offer outdoor education in an authentically Catholic way,” Zach explained, because many outdoor programs already in existence are either secular or Protestant.
“As we had more qualified staff from the student population to offer the trips,” he said, “we felt like there was a real need in the Church, and there wasn’t anyone doing that: authentic outdoor trips with professional guidance. We started to offer trips to more and more groups.”
Zach was COR’s first employee in2016. “From there, we’ve doubled the number of trips each year, aside from 2020 during coronavirus,” he said.
For a while, there was some question as to whether COR would stay connected with WCC. Now, it’s been decided that “WCC wants COR forever. We’ve officially been operating as an outreach of WCC since the beginning; we share a mission in the shared values of the Catholic faith through contact with God’s first book.” The benefit of partnering with WCC is that the groups share permits, which means that COR can offer trips in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah. They have also offered custom trips in California, Florida, Texas, Kentucky, Montana, and even abroad in New Zealand, Iceland and Scotland. Front-country leadership trainings are available across the United States.
“We’re bringing the liberal arts and holistic education to others through steeping people in wonder and helping them grow in their spiritual lives from that position of wonder,” Sarah said.
Zach added that COR focuses especially on two types of client. ”We want to help renew the faith of those who are already in the Church, such as religious orders like the CFRs or discipleship groups like FOCUS, and we see COR as a way to engage them more deeply.
“At the same time, we have a big heart for those who haven’t had contact with the Church, or maybe haven’t practiced in a while, and somehow they got onto one of our trips,” he said. “They experience the sacraments in a new way: we’ve had people make first confessions, Rosaries, Adoration. Our mission is unique because we can draw someone in who might not otherwise do a ‘faith based’ activity, but they get excited about a rock climbing, backpacking or rafting trip.”
Their impact so far has been impressive. They have worked with more than 2,500 college students, 350 FOCUS missionaries, 100 seminarians, 30 chaplains, 400 school students, 50 wounded veterans and 100 families. They have nine full-time missionaries who fundraise their salaries.
For both Zach and Sarah, their time at WCC had an undeniable influence on their development of COR. Sarah explained, “There’s the practical component that WCC provided us with our first formal training in the outdoors, beginning to develop those core skills in the outdoor program. I would also say that the opportunities at WCC to develop leadership and to have mentorship in leadership were helpful, such as for me, being a prefect, or for Zach, being involved with the parish’s youth group.”
“From the academic perspective,” she added, “when I graduated from WCC, I felt incredibly blessed with the education that I had received, especially in theology, philosophy and humanities, and because of the appreciation I had for it, it made me strongly desire to share it. When I graduated from the College, I was still among a small number of people who had received that education. There were so many who hadn’t received such an education, and this is why I wanted to work in ministry.”
For Zach, “COR would not have been possible without the mentorship and position that Dr. Zimmer [the College’s outdoor program coordinator] gave me, and the empowerment that the outdoor program gave me. My experiences in the outdoors here opened my eyes to wonder for the first time, and the idea that God can work through His First Book. I never thought that ministry could exist in outdoor programs, that it didn’t need four walls. God could encounter people individually in the wilderness.”
WCC has inspired the entire COR missionary team: “From the communication skills in rhetoric to the leadership from the outdoor program, it astounds me how well we work together as a team, in comparison to some other organizations I’ve worked with,” Zach said. “Some of the simple things we learned here are profoundly new ideas in other places.”
Sarah added, “WCC set an incredible example, especially in the founders, that we feel called by the Church to do this, and we’re going to make it happen, against all odds. That really inspired us. When God asks, we answer. We believe that He will provide.”
“A small group of people can change the world, our ideas matter, our thoughts matter, our passions matter,” Zach said. “The examples we had for those realities were really strong, simply by the College saying that our students will be the leaders of the Church.”
The Carlstroms hope that COR will continue to grow. “Coming to a college that was just getting its feet made starting a ministry not seem as daunting,” they said. “The pioneer spirit of WCC just carried forward in COR, and will only continue to do so.”
Crafting Mission-Centered Parent-School Agreements
/in Mission and Governance Admissions and Enrollment, Commentary/by Dr. Denise Donohue Ed.D.Parents are the primary educators of their children, even when entrusting them to Catholic schools. This has implications for school communications with parents, but it also means that parents should be in full agreement with the evangelizing mission of a Catholic school before enrolling a student. It is best when that agreement is in writing.
Parent and school contracts or agreements should detail the mission of the school and the behavioral expectations for those within the school community. They can be separate documents or part of the school handbook, signed and returned to the school. They should explain the duties and requirements of teachers, administrators, students and parents. Parents have the right to know what student accommodations or classroom interventions their child might expect and in what areas the school is unable to accommodate their child.
The parent-school agreement or the handbook signature page acts as a contract between the two parties—the parents and the school—of which payment is only one part. An agreement helps clarify the relationship and school policies, especially those that may be flashpoints for conflict and potential litigation. Rather than shying away from difficult topics, advance agreements prevent confusion, help avoid potential lawsuits and aids the institution in safeguarding its religious mission.
Of course, many situations calling for disciplinary measures cannot be anticipated in advance. No handbook can cover everything, so many times a general clause or statement is entered into the school handbook that states the principal reserves the right to amend the handbook at any time and has final recourse for all disciplinary issues.
The goal is clarity from the Catholic school, helping parents understand the nature of Catholic education and the school’s expectations for parents and students. Surprising families with rules and disciplinary actions after enrollment can upset parents and increase tensions.
Parent-school agreements have the added advantage of helping parents determine for their selves whether Catholic education is the right fit for their children. The admissions process is based on the acknowledgement that not every prospective student can or should be part of the school community. Explaining the school’s mission and expectations before enrollment, so that parents can decide on withdrawing an application based on their inability to sign the parent-school agreement, is a much happier circumstance than having to deny admission—especially if parents remain confused or irate over the decision.
It can also be a good practice for Catholic schools to help parents understand the mission of Catholic education and expectations of students and parents even before applying for admission. A simple form requiring acknowledgement that parents have read certain materials explaining the school’s approach to education can deter those who simply cannot abide by Catholic teachings, preventing the awkward situation of denying enrollment to a student who was initially admitted without knowing the demands of Catholic education.
It is well worth taking these steps to protect and nurture the learning environment, as strong supportive relationships and shared vision among parents and school personnel help facilitate the intellectual, moral, emotional, physical and spiritual development of children.
Handling the Tough Cases: Admissions Policies for Nontraditional Families
/in Mission and Governance Admissions and Enrollment, Commentary/by Dr. Dan GuernseyAlmost half of U.S. Catholics want the Church to recognize same-sex unions, according to the Pew Research Center. A majority support administering the Eucharist to cohabiting couples and divorced/remarried Catholics without an annulment.
These views differ sharply with the Church’s clear teaching on marriage, and we see similar confusion and disagreement among Catholics and in society at large over moral behaviors concerning gender, abortion, dress, language and more. It is not only a matter of disagreement with Catholic doctrine, but actual immoral practices and disintegration of the family.
For Catholic schools, this makes the admissions process all the more difficult. Some families today who seek enrollment in Catholic schools are deeply wounded or confused about marriage, parenting and human sexuality as God intends. Are they a good fit for Catholic schools?
Seeking God’s plan
Most of today’s parents grew up in a post-“sexual revolution” world, where the media have relentlessly promoted values and behaviors at odds with Catholic teaching. Even many Catholic parents are either unaware of a Catholic understanding in these areas or have dismissed or rejected them. Students are also suffering with deep confusion, with media messages telling them there are numerous gender identities and that feelings can trump their biology.
In all cases, Catholic schools must handle each case in a sensitive and charitable manner while maintaining faithfulness to Church teaching. In working with nontraditional or wounded families, educators should listen and seek to understand their complexities and limitations. Schools should not underestimate the time, compassion and resources this worthwhile outreach will require or assume that the school is the best or only vehicle for evangelization in such cases.
Keep in mind that nontraditional families are not burdens, but beloved children of a God who loves them intimately and has a plan of growth, healing or conversion for them. During the admissions process, Catholic schools can facilitate the conversation around that divine plan. It may include delaying or denying enrollment if certain behaviors pose a threat to the school’s religious mission or cause confusion and scandal. The expectation and right of enrolled students to receive formation that leads them to God—and not away from Him—takes priority over admitting a problematic new student.
Not every school has the capacity to sufficiently address the needs of children or their family members who desire enrollment in the school. Some families must be turned toward other alternatives for education, either because their views of life’s ultimate purpose and end are at odds with those of the Church, or because their example would lead others to sin. Such families might benefit from other forms of Catholic education, including homeschooling and parish catechetical instruction, that avoid some of the demands of a formal school community.
For instance, an atheistic family who vocalizes faith that a theistic God is a sham, or a family heavily into the occult or New Age religion. Admitting others who actively and publicly engage in cohabitation, polygamy, incest, or homosexual activity might be seen as condoning this type of behavior. The school must see that its religious mission of moral formation and evangelization is not publicly compromised, hindered or undone by significantly off-mission families.
Admitting such families might create mixed messages for the admitted student and others who are unable to rectify this cognitive dissonance. At some point, the school will teach a message opposite what the students are experiencing: that true Christian marriage is between one man and one woman, that God does in fact exist, that there are only two biological sexes, and so on. This will inevitably cause older children to question the actions of their adult family members or their teacher, pitting one against the other and creating skepticism of the teachings of the faith or distrust to authority in the minds and hearts of the students.
Many cases of nontraditional families (families other than a married couple of one man and one woman validly married in the Church) can be corrected through catechesis in the faith, such as for those who have a nascent understanding of Church teaching or those who come from a non-Catholic Christian background or other faith-based tradition. Cohabitating couples or parents who are divorced and remarried outside the Church have ways of correcting and regularizing their relationships.
Those Catholic families who struggle significantly with the acceptance of elements of Catholic faith or morals need the help of their parish priest or staff to discuss areas of conflict or uncertainty and to seek reconciliation with the Church. The integrity of such pastoral intervention is absolutely dependent on pastors and counselors being faithful to Catholic teaching and working closely in harmony with the Catholic school administrators and teachers as a cohesive team.
Examples of nontraditional families
Today there is a growing variety of family situations that pose difficulties for Catholic school admissions teams. Some are described briefly below, but I provide a deeper and more nuanced reflection in my paper, “Working with Nontraditional Families in Catholic Schools.”
Family from another faith: Catholic schools will normally welcome non-Catholic families of goodwill who are expressly and affirmatively supportive of the school’s primary Catholic religious mission, with the exception of Satanic, wiccan, occult or other blasphemous behaviors or practices which are serious conflicts with a Catholic school’s mission. Open hostility, public defiance and public challenges against Catholic truths or morality are signs that a family is not a good fit for a school’s primary evangelical mission. Non-Catholic students deserve the same religious instruction as Catholics and attend the same religious services and activities, participating to the extent they are able. Formal or ritual non-Catholic prayer services or activities are inappropriate and may be blasphemous.
Single-parent household: A single-parent household is not normally a barrier to enrolling in a Catholic school. The parent—like all parents—agrees to work in harmony with the school as it teaches the Catholic faith concerning marriage, chastity and divorce and to avoid behaviors which are contrary to Catholic teaching such as sexual promiscuity or adultery.
Cohabiting couple forming a household: A school should refer such couples to the local pastor for counseling and catechesis, in the hope of starting down a path of regularization. A couple may avoid scandal by living in chastity appropriate to their state in life. But if a pastor is aware that a catechized couple refuses to strive for a life of chastity, and in his judgment the couple is unlikely to consider such a move with additional outreach and catechesis, he may need to instruct them against enrolling their student. This is especially necessary if issues of public scandal arise.
Parents divorced and remarried outside the Church: The Church considers a valid marriage to be a permanent union between a man and a woman. Those who have divorced and remarried outside the Church and are reasonably assumed to be sexually active are involved in living an immoral lifestyle. A school may ask the couple to meet with the local parish priest to determine their status and if and how that status might be regularized in the Church, while doing all they can to avoid scandalizing students. If a couple refuses to attempt regularization or is unwilling to strive to meet Church requirements given their marital status, it may be prudent to deny admission.
Same-sex union: This circumstance is not identical to that of other parents in irregular or immoral family situations, which often can be regularized and may be publicly ambiguous. Same-sex couples who advocate and persist in their union actively and publicly model a different morality, present a lived counter-evangelization, and have a different understanding of what Christian integration of the mind, body and spirit looks like. Admitting students from families formed around same-sex unions, therefore, is a certain cause of scandal in Catholic schools and invites moral confusion. The couple is openly engaged in and openly promotes public, unrepentant, objectively disordered behavior, and the school itself can become complicit in confusion and scandal if it generates the appearance of normalcy, since the couple cannot possibly be on a path of regularization.
Student presenting with same-sex attraction: All students are called to chastity, which is the successful integration of sexuality within the person according to their state in life. A Catholic school’s mission is compromised if students are allowed to advocate or celebrate same-sex attraction as a personal positive good in the context of classes, activities or events. The school should not permit identification with such terms as “gay,” “lesbian,” “bisexual,” or “queer.” During the admissions process, a faithful Catholic school will present students who disclose same-sex attraction the beautiful and liberating teachings of the Catholic Church on God’s design for the human person and human sexuality. These students should, as a condition of enrollment, work with appropriate Church and diocesan offices, ministries and counselors in the hope of living in harmony with Christ’s teachings.
Parent identifying contrary to biological sex: The Catholic school can present such parents with the Church’s teaching about the human person and God’s plan for mankind and agree to this teaching for their children. In particular cases, parents may be directed to the local pastor and other faith-based psychologists and medical personnel, who can work with them to address their gender dysphoria. As a condition of a student’s enrollment, the parent whose sense of sexual identity is compromised agrees not to draw attention to his or her gender incongruence, so as not to confuse or scandalize the students.
Student identifying contrary to biological sex: A faithful Catholic school will inform the student and the student’s parents that the school interacts with all students according to their biological sex, not professed “gender identities.” The family should be willing to work toward integrating the student’s sexual identity with their biological sex, including counseling with their pastor and other trained Catholic medical and psychological professionals who are best able to help them in clarifying and defining issues of self (and sexual) identity in accord with Catholic teaching and God’s natural plan. If the student or parents insist on a name, clothing or behavior that publicly signal gender dysphoria, the student may not be a good fit for the school.
Student conceived by in-vitro fertilization or surrogacy: Children are always a gift from God, no matter the circumstances of their conception. But a parent’s or student’s public and persistent advocacy for these artificial methods of generating life, which undermines the teaching of the Church and the formative efforts of the school, is cause for denying admission.
Seeking true good for families
The challenges facing Catholic schools and the often-wounded families they are called to serve are significant and can almost seem overwhelming. This is a time calling not just for compassion, but also for courage. Courage to fulfill this ministry is required in a culture which may brand such teaching as judgmental or intolerant.
Instead, a faithful Catholic school demonstrates true compassion for nontraditional families. This may involve enrolling a family in a Catholic school, or it may require revoking, denying or delaying enrollment as a family undergoes faith formation and regularization through other Church ministries. In either case, the desire is to meet them where they are and eventually bring them home to full communion with Christ and His Church.
Newman Society, Newman Guide Colleges Featured on Ave Maria Radio
/in Blog Latest/by Cardinal Newman Society StaffThe Cardinal Newman Society recently organized a college fair of sorts with Coleen Kelly Mast, host of the “Mast Appeal” Radio Show on Ave Maria Radio (also syndicated on EWTN).
Newman Society President Patrick Reilly kicked off the discussion with Coleen by explaining why colleges are recommended in The Newman Guide, and the unique value of faithful Catholic higher education.
For the remainder of the two-hour radio show, Coleen interviewed students and recent graduates of Newman Guide colleges about their experiences at the colleges. What amazing things they had to say!
A recording of the show is available and would make a great resource to share with Catholic families who are navigating the college search. Here is the link to the show from December 11, 2021.
Down to the Buzzer, Religious Colleges Score with NCAA
/in Blog Athletics, Commentary Latest, PR Register Column/by Patrick ReillyHere’s some great news, just in time for the holy feast of Christmas: At the last moment before approving its new revised constitution, the governing board of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) added broad protection for Catholic and other religious colleges to continue participating in the college association.
The NCAA constitution still needs to be ratified by the membership on Jan. 20, but the draft they will be considering is much improved.
Just last week, with the desperate hope that sunlight might help disinfect the NCAA’s diseased constitutional revision process, I went public at the National Catholic Register with concerns raised by faithful Catholic and other Christian colleges. They have been struggling valiantly to defend against an earlier amendment to the NCAA constitution that seemed intended to push out religious colleges with traditional (i.e., truthful and rational) views of sexuality and gender.
By adding deliberately pointed language to its constitution — that colleges must “comply with federal and state laws and local ordinances, including respect to gender equity, diversity and inclusion” — the NCAA appeared to be stacking the deck against religious colleges, at least those colleges that have remained faithful to Christian tradition and have refused to violate the integrity of women’s sports and the sanctity of marriage and sexuality.
This was the result of lobbying by activists including the anti-Catholic Human Rights Campaign, which last month sent a letter to NCAA governors complaining that drafts of the constitution did not explicitly embrace gender ideology. Although the HRC complained about a few state and local laws that prevent biological men from competing in women’s sports, drafters of the NCAA constitution cleverly latched onto the much more extensive push by many states, counties, cities, and even the federal government to force gender ideology on schools and colleges.
Such efforts, of course, violate the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause if they interfere with religious colleges’ ability to conform to their religious beliefs, and colleges are likely to prevail in court when they contest violations of their religious freedom. Nevertheless, last week’s draft of the NCAA constitution could have allowed the association to ban Catholic colleges from participation even while they fight in court to preserve their mission.
“The Catholic attempt to use sport toward the integral formation of the human person and to give praise and honor to the Creator is subverted by competing ideologies in the common culture, especially gender ideology,” warns the Cardinal Newman Society’s standards for athletics policies at Catholic schools and colleges. “The issue is bigger than just about sexual politics; Catholic educators must resist gender theories that aim to annihilate the concept of nature and our understanding of who we are and how we exist in the world.”
Faithful Newman Guide colleges including Benedictine College, The Catholic University of America, the University of Mary and Walsh University joined many other religious colleges in urging the NCAA to add another provision to its constitution, ensuring their rights to uphold their religious missions. The effort succeeded, just as the NCAA governors approved the final constitution.
The proposed language from the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities said, “Consistent with the principles of institutional control, nothing herein should be construed to restrict or limit private religious institutions from adopting or maintaining policies consistent with their legal rights as private religious institutions.”
No one in the NCAA should have had a problem with that language. But the “woke” agenda prevented its inclusion in the final draft constitution that was presented to the NCAA governors last week, before the governors apparently decided that losing Catholic colleges as members would be a harmful to the association and patently unfair to religious institutions.
In a surprising and exciting turnaround, the constitution approved by the governors on Thurs., Dec. 16, is very similar to what the religious colleges wanted and should be helpful in protecting their distinctive missions. It includes the language: “Consistent with the principle of institutional control, no provision in this Constitution should be construed to restrict or limit colleges and universities, public or private, from adopting or maintaining missions and policies consistent with their legal rights or obligations as institutions of high learning.”
Deo gratias! We shall see whether the constitution is approved on Jan. 20. But already religious colleges have taken an important step forward, and by their witness they have shown the importance of never giving in to the worst elements of our culture. Faithful Catholic education is worth fighting for, and it was the smaller but most faithful colleges that helped achieve this valuable protection.
This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.
Will the NCAA Force Out Catholic Colleges?
/in Blog Latest, PR Register Column/by Patrick ReillyAthletics has long been an important part of Catholic education in the United States, but trouble is brewing.
Already schools and colleges face social and legal pressure to abandon their Catholic mission and conform to gender ideology by allowing biological males to play on girls’ sports teams and enter locker rooms.
Now, proposed changes to the constitution of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) could prevent Catholic colleges from participating in the premier league, unless it takes steps to protect Catholic education’s commitment to truth and religious freedom. At the moment, it seems the NCAA has no intention of doing that.
The hurried effort to update the NCAA constitution — with a vote expected on Jan. 20 — is prompted by legal issues concerning the commercialization of student-athletes, financial disparities among the association’s three divisions and calls for greater institutional autonomy. Still, the process could not avoid the political correctness of our time. The latest draft proposal includes a new provision demanding that colleges “comply with federal and state laws and local ordinances, including respect to gender equity, diversity and inclusion.”
That might seem harmless, to require compliance with the law. But then again, why is there a need to add such a provision, with specific reference to “gender equity, diversity and inclusion”? There is an agenda here that threatens religious institutions.
Pushing out Catholic colleges
Earlier this year, the NCAA Board of Governors updated its policies to allow women to participate on either men’s or women’s teams, based on their self-declared gender. Men may compete on women’s teams if they have completed a year of testosterone suppression treatment. But religious colleges have preserved their autonomy to do what they know is best for their student-athletes.
The NCAA also publicly opposed state and local laws upholding the integrity of women’s athletics, declaring that it “firmly and unequivocally supports the opportunity for transgender student-athletes to compete in college sports.” No law, in fact, excludes students from participating in college sports, but they may be required to compete with others of the same biological sex.
The most dangerous laws go in the other direction. Many states and localities — and more recently, the federal government under the Biden administration — have sought to force religious institutions to adopt gender ideology in direct contradiction to their moral beliefs and understanding of human biology. This is done under the guise of nondiscrimination law.
Faithful Catholic colleges, however, do not truly discriminate against students with gender dysphoria. Instead, they have steadfastly upheld the advances made in women’s sports and have protected students morally and physically from the unreasonable demands of gender ideology, while the secular world endangers girls to satisfy activist demands and undermines hard-won opportunities to compete in sex-specific competitions.
Under federal law, religious institutions currently have some protections — despite recent court case attempting to erase the religious exemption in Title IX, which opposes sex discrimination in education but has been interpreted to mandate certain LGBT policies. The Biden administration supports legislation including the horrendous Equality Act that would unconstitutionally force religious institutions to comply with gender ideology.
If it becomes necessary for Catholic colleges to assert their rights and fight any new law or regulation in court — a law or regulation violating the religious mission of the colleges — how will the NCAA respect its members’ religious freedom? Based on the proposed new amendment to the NCAA constitution, it might be that the NCAA would exclude faithful colleges like Belmont Abbey College, the Catholic University of America and the University of Mary from participation. They could technically be in violation of existing (although clearly unconstitutional) laws.
In states and localities, legal protection for religious freedom is less secure, since the Title IX exemption for religious colleges and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) concern only federal law. Catholic colleges do have recourse to claims under the First Amendment, but fighting state and local laws that threaten religious education takes time, and many courts are not friendly to religious concerns when set against gender ideology.
Again, how will the NCAA treat a Catholic college fighting an unjust state or local law? Will it stand by its members? Instead, it seems the new constitutional provision is intended to push out any college that stands by traditional and natural divisions of the sexes in college sports.
This is the irony of the campaign for LGBT nondiscrimination protections: whereas new laws and private association rules will likely have minimal effect in correcting unjust discrimination — which has never been proven to be a widespread problem for LGBT-identifying Americans — the nation’s majority of religious people will be targeted and subjected to all kinds of legally protected discrimination for maintaining their religious beliefs and truthful policies toward gender and sexuality.
The result is much more discrimination, not less, and the erosion of America’s bedrock principle of religious freedom.
Solution rejected
If the NCAA does not intend such a threat to religious education, there is an easy fix: another amendment that recognizes the distinctive and appropriate needs of religious colleges.
That is precisely what some Catholic colleges, together with the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities, proposed before the latest draft constitution — and yet their request was ignored. The language they suggested was quite simple: “Consistent with the principles of institutional control, nothing herein should be construed to restrict or limit private religious institutions from adopting or maintaining policies consistent with their legal rights as private religious institutions.”
The NCAA’s failure to embrace religious freedom and adopt this simple amendment is a very clear signal that its intentions toward Catholic and other religious colleges are not good. Efforts continue to advocate a religious freedom amendment in the new draft expected around Dec. 15. Without the amendment, NCAA members should reject the new constitution.
Otherwise, faithful Catholic colleges may have no option but to leave the troubled NCAA. What a great tragedy for all concerned, especially the young men and women whose interests are the last priority in the relentless march of ideological extremism.
This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.
Newman Guide Colleges Increase ‘Recruit Me’ Scholarship to $20,000
/in Blog Newman Guide Articles/by Cardinal Newman Society StaffSeveral faithful Catholic colleges recognized by The Cardinal Newman Society have generously chosen to supplement the Society’s “Recruit Me” scholarship, potentially increasing the amount from $5,000 to $20,000 over four years.
The Newman Society’s annual Essay Scholarship Contest rewards a U.S. high school senior with a one-time $5,000 scholarship toward the cost of attending one of the colleges recommended in The Newman Guide. To be eligible, a student must sign up for Recruit Me, a program that invites Newman Guide colleges to compete for promising candidates.
High school seniors can submit their application and essay for the seventh annual Essay Scholarship Contest until February 20, 2023.
The winner will have the opportunity to be awarded $20,000 over the course of four years. Several of the Newman Guide colleges have agreed to supplement the Newman Society’s scholarship with additional $5,000 grants over three additional years. In order for the scholarship to continue, the student must be enrolled full-time and maintain satisfactory academic progress. Some of the colleges have additional requirements.
The following Newman Guide colleges have opted to supplement the Newman Society scholarship, should a winning student choose to attend their institution:
The Newman Society’s $5,000 scholarship is made possible by the generosity of Joseph and Ann Guiffre, supporters of the Newman Society and faithful Catholic education. Supporters of the participating Newman Guide colleges have generously provided the funds for the supplemental awards.
The Newman Society encourages Catholic families to tell family and friends about the Essay Scholarship Contest and the value of faithful Catholic education. Questions about the Essay Scholarship Contest can be directed to Programs@CardinalNewmanSociety.org.
Abortion Advocacy, Sex Contests Have No Place in Catholic Education
/in Blog Latest, PR Register Column/by Patrick ReillyWhat kind of lunacy must this be, when the Pope unambiguously calls abortion “murder,” yet a Catholic university hosts a fundraiser to support America’s largest abortion business?
Or when students at a Catholic high school walk out in protest of a pro-life speaker?
Or Catholic college students compete for numbers of sexual conquests?
“Catholic education is an expression of the Church’s mission of salvation and an instrument of evangelization: to make disciples of Christ and to teach them to observe all that he has commanded.” If ever the need for a renewal of truth and fidelity in our Catholic education was more obvious, it is certainly clear now.
Faithful alumni of Loyola Marymount University (LMU) in Los Angeles — sponsored by the Jesuits, Marymount Sisters, and Sisters of St. Joseph in Orange — are urging signatures on a petition protesting a university-hosted fundraiser for the abortion giant Planned Parenthood scheduled for this Friday, Nov. 5. It is sponsored by a student group, LMU Women in Politics.
The University told Catholic News Agency, “The fundraiser being hosted by Women in Politics is not a university-sponsored event. However, the existence of these student organizations and their activities are living examples that LMU embraces its mission, commitments, and complexities of free and honest discourse.”
Not a university event? Consider this:
1. LMU Women in Politics is a “Registered Student Organization” at the University. Its radical feminist mission includes emphasis on “LGBTQ+ women, gender queer, and non binary individuals.” In September, the group protested the “terrifying” Texas ban on many abortions.
2. Friday’s event is scheduled to occur in LMU’s Roski Dining Hall on campus.
3. The “Planned Parenthood Fundraiser” was advertised in LMU’s student calendar until this afternoon, after substantial media attention. Calls to the LMU media office to confirm the reason were not returned before publishing this article.
Then there are the students at Archbishop Riordan High School, a Catholic high school in San Francisco, which last year became co-ed after being an all-boys school. A recent school assembly featured pro-life speaker Megan Almon, part of the Life Training Institute, which, as Catholic News Agency states, seeks to “empower others with the knowledge and conviction necessary to make a case for life that changes hearts and minds.”
About five minutes into Almon’s speech, almost all 800 students walked out, leaving only a few dozen students left to listen to her talk. The interim president, Tim Reardon, appropriately defended the talk, telling CNA, “Many of the parents sent their kids to Catholic school so that the kids could learn about Catholic social teaching. To avoid these topics would be a failure to serve these individuals.”
The College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University are investigating reports that male students from St. John’s held a “sex competition” to see who could score the most female sexual partners from the College of St. Benedict.
Students who were appalled by the news recently staged a walkout, because they believed that the colleges were not doing enough about the allegations. Aisha Sadik told those who gathered in protest, “Some Johnnies allow their peers and friends to get away with these actions because it has nothing to do with them. … Bennies have talked about how scared they feel walking alone at St. John’s University.”
In Ex corde Ecclesiae, the apostolic constitution on Catholic higher education by Pope St. John Paul II, he states, “If need be, a Catholic University must have the courage to speak uncomfortable truths which do not please public opinion, but which are necessary to safeguard the authentic good of society” (No. 32).
He specifically calls on Catholic educators to fulfill their duty in proclaiming the truth of the dignity of all human life. Especially in our current culture, these truths are not always popular, especially as we’ve seen in the debates over the Texas Heartbeat Bill.
Nevertheless, it is the purpose of Catholic education to teach truth in fidelity to our Catholic faith. When failures occur, Catholic families need the entire Church to stand with them in protecting students from scandal, rejecting institutions that deny the truth of Catholic teachings, and redoubling efforts to renew faithful Catholic education.
This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.