The "Catholic" in Catholic High Schools

The summer of my first year as headmaster of Pope John Paul II High School, I wrote a letter to parents, introducing myself, and attached a simple card, asking parents to tell me what was best about our school in their eyes, and also, their top concern. When the results came back, the #1 area of concern was “We’re not Catholic enough.” The #2 concern? “We’re ­too Catholic.”

Those results, of course, reflect a polarization in our contemporary Church of what it means to be “Catholic,” ranging from those who believe we should be hosting daily Marian devotions, to those who are more interested in social justice initiatives, to Catholics who don’t really care deeply either way. The results also reflected the estrangement of our non-Catholic families (40% of our school). How then, do we Catholic high school principals navigate these divides?

I think there are several wrong approaches.

The first wrong approach is to steer the school to a “lowest common denominator” Catholicism that emphasizes its “Christianity,” while de-emphasizing its more distinctively “Catholic” elements: Less frequent masses, less Marian devotions, less emphasis on the liturgical season and celebrations of that season, a singular emphasis on Scripture vs. a broader inclusion of the writings of the saints, popes, or doctors of the Church.  The problem with this approach is that it reduces Catholicism to a banal, uninteresting faith that very few students find attractive. It’s the weirdly odd people, celebrations and liturgical practices that give Catholicism so much flavor, so much “style,” and makes the faith memorable, distinctive and appealing to our students. 

When I came to JPII, for example, we had an Ash Wednesday mass, but no Mardi Gras celebration. Growing up in Mobile, Al (site of the first Mardi Gras celebrations--New Orleans take note), this was unacceptable to me, so now, as a small thing, students know that at some point during Fat Tuesday, I will come to their classrooms with bags of candy and throw candy at them. Lest students think our namesake Pope John Paul II was all work and no fun, we acquired the pope’s ski jacket as a gift from the Vatican, and put up a display in our hallway, emphasizing that JPII was not only a pope, but a skier, kayaker, poet, soccer player, linguist, and playwright. The ancient Catholic practice of veneration of relics supports this. Our  six “Houses,” the very framework of our students’ social life, are named after six popes, and once/year, the lives of each pope is celebrated, with students in those houses able to take a “dress down” day.  We built an outdoor “Stations of the Cross” path in adjacent woods, encouraging our students to pray the “Via Crucis.” 

I believe one of the real problems for our Church in the intermediate aftermath of Vatican II was that many Catholics became embarrassed by our more unusual celebrations and moved away from them, unwittingly reducing our faith to something that was trite and boring. We should do the opposite in our schools!

The second wrong approach, in my opinion, is to attempt to walk a middle path between liberal and conservative Catholicism and keep careful “score” that our schools are not veering off into either direction. I believe this is wrong-headed in that is continues to measure our Catholicism with the wrong metric.  “Liberal” and “Conservative” are political labels that carry a lot of baggage, and if that is the lens through which we allow ourselves to be understood, we’re likely to carry those bags with us and encourage those polarities to fester.  Instead, “orthodoxy” should be that lens, and that means, I think, embracing the FULL tradition and history of liturgical practices, past and present. 

Many Catholics have far too narrow a vision of their faith, often a function of their preference, upbringing and sensibilities. But one of the beauties of Catholicism is its all-inclusiveness of a variety of traditions, and we should be open to all of them! So, for example, during our weekly Masses, we want to expose kids not only to contemporary praise worship, but also to the ancient songs, chants and hymns of our tradition. The way we do this is alternate music groups every other Mass, with our choral program leading one week, singing the more traditional hymns, and a student led folk group leading us the next week, singing more contemporary music. We once hosted a Tridentine Mass for our student body, but we’ve also hosted a youth rally which culminated in a Christian rock musician, Matt Maher, leading the music for mass--two entirely different experiences!  We’ll do Eucharistic adoration once or twice a year, but we also have a strong service requirement, where kids are asked to work with the under-privileged. We frequently recite the Our Father and Hail Mary as part of our common life together, but we also encourage students to pray contemporaneously.  Quotes from scripture, the saints, various popes, decorate our hallways. We’re not trying to "balance" the various polarities of our faith as if they're in competition with each other. We’re doing these things in faithfulness to the "both-and-ness" of our wonderfully diverse tradition, hoping that students see and experience the fullness of what it means to be Catholic. 

I think, too, we need to be much more imaginative and bold in defining the mission of our schools and discussing this mission with others. John Paul II, Benedict and Francis have each articulated the faith in powerful, evangelical ways that are deeply appealing to youth and to their parents, regardless of where they stand on the theological spectrum and regardless of church affiliation. Here are three examples:

JPII once told youth:  “It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.”

Benedict once said: “Young people, the world promises you comfort, but you were not made for comfort.  You were made for greatness!”

And Francis, recently, speaking to young people about marriage, had this to say: "Today, there are those who say that marriage is out of fashion... They say that it is not worth making a life-long commitment, making a definitive decision, ‘for ever’, because we do not know what tomorrow will bring. I ask you, instead, to be revolutionaries, I ask you to swim against the tide; yes, I am asking you to rebel against this culture that sees everything as temporary and that ultimately believes you are incapable of responsibility, that believes you are incapable of true love."

This way of talking about the Catholic faith, challenging young people to be cultural revolutionaries, to strive for holiness and seek greatness for their lives, cuts across religious divides and digs down to the heart of the gospel message. The gospels have the power to change lives! When we proclaim them boldly and creatively, we too, speak powerfully of our Catholic mission.

May we have the vision and confidence to so lead our schools!

Promoting Philanthropy in Catholic Schools

In development parlance, “fund-raising” is when we sell something to someone for the purpose of raising money—bake sales, car-washes, raffles and tickets for the annual dinner Gala, for example—and is therefore not tax deductible.  “Philanthropy” refers to straight up giving, either for unrestricted or restricted purposes, and is tax-deductible.

We in Catholic schools are excellent fund-raisers, but we are less adept in encouraging philanthropy. No doubt there are many reasons for this: the fact that we are parish schools wedded to a tithing model, such  that philanthropic appeals come primarily through the Church and not the school, the fact that we haven’t invested in development professionals, and the more generalized fact that we are short on administrative infrastructure across the board, meaning that principals don’t have time to "cultivate donors."  I think, too, there’s a general feeling that we already ask families to stretch to pay our tuitions, so we worry that asking for “more” seems to under-appreciate their commitment and make those unable to give feel inadequate. 

Even to the extent these are legitimate, I think it’s foolish of us to not focus more on improving philanthropic giving.  Let me address each of the concerns:

Yes, we ask for our parishioners to tithe, but some are more inclined to give generously to the school their children or grandchildren attend than to the parish they belong to or the priest that they are grumpy with. It doesn’t “take away” anything from the parish collections if philanthropists give to the parish school, since ultimately, the parish school’s money and the parish’s money are the same.  And in the case that the child’s family is from a different parish, even if a school appeal causes some discernible decrease in that other parish’s tithe, I’d argue the parish with the school is probably spending a lot more to support that school than whatever subsidy the second parish pays (once insurance, yard work, janitorial help, professional staffing and other “hidden” costs are factored in).

Yes, our Catholic schools are understaffed (especially our elementary schools—I have suggested ways to address this here), which limits how much philanthropic work our principals can do. But even with that, there are simple appeals that end up taking much less time (and raising more money) than the fund-raisers we do through-out the year. 

• At minimum, we should send out an “annual fund appeal” letter from a principal or deeply respected teacher in our school, with an envelope attached, during the November-December time frame.
• We should allow families to “check a box” to sponsor a second child’s tuition (or 50%, or 25%) whenever they register for next year, to “make the gift of Catholic education available for someone else.”
• At the annual gala, the principal of the school should make a brief public appeal on behalf of a few current (unnamed) families who are behind on tuition payments because of a job loss, or a divorce, or some unexpected event.  All of us have families that entered into tuition contracts with us in good faith, but because of an unforeseen event, are no longer able to meet their obligations. Most of us write these off, but we have families more than willing to help if they know their donations are going directly to these families and not to the “black hole” of administration.  I try to give just enough specifics about these families to inspire generosity without violating their confidentiality. We typically raise $15-25K in the couple of minutes it takes for me to make these appeals. Once I receive their gift, I call the family with the good news that an anonymous "angel" has given us money to support them, and ask them to send me a thank you letter, which I then pass on to the donor. 
• On-line giving is more prominent now than it was even three years ago, and is particularly used by our younger alumni. Putting a link on the web page is easy, and providing for this link in an email campaign in conjunction with the annual fund letter is a very efficient appeal.
• Ask your parish to include a “special collection” for the purpose of supporting the parish school during Catholic schools week or at some other appropriate time each year. Monies raised could either relieve the Church of that month’s allocation to the school, or could be used directly by the school itself.
• I believe that once a year during Sunday Masses, similar to what we do with the annual diocesan appeal, the pastor should appeal to his parishioners to make provisions for the Church or the school (again, it’s the same entity) in their will. Most families are incapable of making a transformative gift during their lifetime. But with a simple codicil in their will, they can leave their house, for example, (or 50%, or 33%, or 25% of it) to the school. Often parents create their wills when their children are very young, so they are concerned about providing for them and thus make them sole beneficiaries, but 20-30 years later, their children may be quite successful, so re-allocating a portion of their will to the Church is not unthinkable. There are likely lawyers and financial planners who would assist families in making a planned gift, gratis, as a means of contributing their services to Catholic schools.

Finally, as to the concern that asking parents for philanthropic gifts some how under-values the commitment they’re making with their tuitions, I think we simply need to get beyond that concern. For one, independent schools charge twice, three times or four times as much tuition as we do and ask their families (some, rather aggressively) to give to annual funds every year. Second, strapped families are not obligated to give if asked, and in fact, have other avenues to give, if inclined, through volunteer service. Third, we have to stop basing our decisions on the impact it might have on our least wealthy families! That formula simply won’t work for us over the long term because it subsidizes the wealthier families who can afford to give more, thus undercutting our ability to help those who can't more directly. It's the same with setting tuitions: we stress over whether our poorer families can absorb tuition increases of 3%, 4%, 5% or 6%,  but the truth is, our tuitions are already too high for these families, and whether we raise tuitions an extra 50, 100 or 150 dollars for the year doesn't matter nearly as much as whether we can give them $2,000 or $3,00o in direct financial aid. But we can't give that kind of aid unless we are maximizing revenue from those who can pay more. 

The mission of our schools is an extraordinary one. We should have no issues in asking people to support this mission in an extraordinary way.