In 1974, Catholic Schools Week was established as the annual celebration of Catholic education in the United States.
This year it occurs from January 26 to February 1. Catholic schools celebrate with Masses, open houses, and other activities for students, families, parishioners, and community members.
Educate whole person
Jesus is the main teacher in Catholic schools, where students learn about Jesus and his teachings. His message is not just a set of intellectual propositions or truths, but a way of life.
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Catholic schools educate the whole person, academically, spiritually, physically, and emotionally. Students are taught to serve family, community, and world in Christ-like ways and make the world a better place. Catholic school students learn that God has a plan for each of them.
The unique characteristic of Catholic schools that Catholics believe is Jesus’ message of eternal life.
Belief in heaven
Since the early Church, belief in heaven has motivated faith-filled Catholics to do great things in this life. They believe that death is the door to heaven and that life has meaning, purpose, and joy.
Catholic school teachers see no contradiction between true science and Christianity, for both are roads to truth. Knowledge is approached with the belief that it can be a window through which we see our Creator’s imprints.
Whether it be a beautiful sunset described poetically, math or science’s intricate laws revealing a universe in the heavens, or the mini universe of a cell, knowledge is approached with the belief that it can reflect the Creator who ultimately authored it.
Learning virtues
Catholic students learn honesty, discipline, values, integrity, and other virtues. They are taught to treat everyone respectfully as unique persons created in God’s image.
They learn morals that will help them meet life’s challenges.
Catholic school students and faculty pray and participate in Mass and receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Inspirational words and images such as crucifixes, saints, and pictures of Jesus are present throughout Catholic schools as reminders of the importance of Jesus and his message.
Grads active in Church
Studies conducted by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University show that among millennials, those who attended Catholic schools are three times more likely to consider a priestly vocation and women are twice as likely to consider Religious Life.
Catholic school students are also over six times more likely to attend Mass weekly, participate in their parish, volunteer, and tithe.
God’s dream
During my 20 years on the faculty at Beloit Catholic High, I concluded that a fruitful Catholic school is one of God’s dreams.
Through God’s grace, this dream can come true when the wider Catholic community of parents, teachers, students, and others do their part to support Catholic schools.
My years in a Catholic school helped me to come closer to Christ thanks to the School Sisters of St. Francis and our pastor. Catholic schools greatly influenced my priestly vocation.
May Catholic school graduates continue to courageously influence a world in need of Christ and make a difference where it counts in their church, home, job, and wherever they are.
Fr. Donald Lange is a pastor emeritus in the Diocese of Madison.