Two hundred years ago, as Catholics started arriving on American shores from countries in
Almost all of these Catholic immigrants came from a very poor background and from families where most people did not know how to read and write. After our Civil War there came a time of a need for massive immigration. It was during the Industrial Revolution. Cheap labor was highly desired by the captains of industry. Illiterate immigrants filled the bill perfectly. They were poor and they wanted jobs. And they worked hard at low paying jobs so they could provide for their families.
The prejudice continued because Catholic values were different from the values of the majority of the nation. Catholics were seen to be clannish – mainly because they had very tight communities of large families, and extended families in their local parishes. They were for the most part very devout Catholics who took their religion seriously, even in the face of the Ku Klux Klan burning crosses on the front lawns of Catholics, as well as Jews and Blacks. They were not a lonely group; they had enormous resources to help them even in their poverty. Families helped each other and the extended church family helped them as well.
One of the most enduring legacies of the church helping these immigrants and their succeeding generations was the Catholic school system. Nearly every parish had a school. Each generation had a group of extraordinarily dedicated women religious who staffed these schools all across the country.
Catholics went from being almost an entirely illiterate immigrant class to becoming the second highest group of best educated Americans. Almost all of us here have in some way benefited from this most extraordinary history.
About 40 years ago as the world went through a worldwide cultural revolution, the numbers of women religious dropped away, so equally dedicated laywomen and men started filling the Catholic schools with their desire to continue the remarkable heritage of previous generations.
Now about that cultural revolution, there is even greater need for Catholic schools today as in generations past. The cultural memory not only of Catholic values, but indeed of most Christian values, is vanishing. Indeed, the culture has become so hostile to Christianity that speaking up for what we believe, has become the one topic which otherwise tolerant people cannot tolerate, whether it is our pro-life stance, our recognition that we need to reign in our more base desires, or our honoring the past and the magnificent record of Western Civilization which was born largely from the Catholic faith.
The future, if it is to be a culture of life and love, needs what we have to offer more than ever. Where are children today hearing things like
The public school system can afford to offer beautiful new up-to-date buildings, like the 33 million dollar
Catholic schools are the locus of prophecy in our day. These are places where the truth is spoken, where God is honored and worshipped, where children learn to go to confession at least twice a year so as to gain some mastery over their baser desires, and where an extraordinary level of general education is going on at a mere fraction of the cost per pupil in public or private schools.
We need to be brave and be like Jesus and Jeremiah, a solid wall of brass bearing witness to the truth, no matter what.
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