A second objective of our pastoral plan is the promotion of Mary Immaculate School. Last week's pastoral plan objective was an expression of the diocesan benchmark of pastoral planning in the area of the parish being a place where all can encounter the mercy and charity of God. This week I examine the objective in light of the benchmark of expressing the co-responsibility of the laity and clergy. 

In the preparatory documents for discerning a pastoral plan, parishes were asked to reflect on this passage, among others, from Evangelium Gaudium #102:

102. Lay people are, put simply, the vast majority of the people of God. The minority – ordained ministers – are at their service. There has been a growing awareness of the identity and mission of the laity in the Church. We can count on many lay persons, although still not nearly enough, who have a deeply-rooted sense of community and great fidelity to the tasks of charity, catechesis and the celebration of the faith. At the same time, a clear awareness of this responsibility of the laity, grounded in their baptism and confirmation, does not appear in the same way in all places. In some cases, it is because lay persons have not been given the formation needed to take on important responsibilities. In others, it is because in their particular Churches room has not been made for them to speak and to act, due to an excessive clericalism which keeps them away from decision-making. Even if many are now involved in the lay ministries, this involvement is not reflected in a greater penetration of Christian values in the social, political and economic sectors. It often remains tied to tasks within the Church, without a real commitment to applying the Gospel to the transformation of society. The formation of the laity and the evangelization of professional and intellectual life represent a significant pastoral challenge.

I can think of no clearer expression of the co-responsibility of the laity and the clergy for the work of evangelization than a Catholic school. The last 60 years have witnessed the shift from a school system that depended on professed religious who exercised their ministry at a great discount to parishes, to a school system that is so much more dependent on the economic forces of this world rather than the eternal values of the Gospel. I won’t go into the theological and canonical distinctions of the different religious orders and the definition of “clergy.” Suffice it to say that our school depends on lay people to support it and lay people to run it. That Mary Immaculate still has a parish school is a true sign of a community that shares its blessings for the sake of the Gospel.

There is one pitfall that lurks around every communal enterprise. It was there when our school was staffed by nuns and it is a dynamic that can exist in a school staffed by lay teachers. Human beings are prone to a “set it and forget it” mentality. That means that once we have the structures and programs in place, we enjoy the liberty of not having to think about the day-to-day processes that are necessary for any system. So what does it really mean to support a parish school?

Our principal and teachers, our staff, our school advisory board, and our school families do the bulk of the heavy lifting for making a school possible and functioning, but we can provide a Catholic school because it rests on the foundation of the support of an entire parish. It is an expression of a fundamental responsibility of every lay Catholic:  to teach our children the way of Jesus Christ in the tradition of the Catholic Church. 

One of the indicators of our gradual transition to a total stewardship parish will be how we transform our financial and volunteer support of the parish school—and indeed all the missions of the parish—from a transactional, client-patron based model to one of tithing our first fruits. The spirituality of stewardship will teach us that each parishioner has an obligation to ensure the right religious education of all our children. There can be no “not my circus, not my monkeys” in regards to Catholic education. 

The same goes for the support of our elementary parish school of religion and our high school youth ministry. My father taught me the importance of stewardship and religious education. All six of his children went to Catholic high schools, and yet he volunteered as a high school religion teacher for twelve years for juniors and seniors in the PSR program. I asked him about this, wondering why he bothered since he had done what he needed for his own children. He told me that his own education in Catholic schools, from first grade all the way through graduating from St. Louis University, taught him the importance of sharing the faith. He said it was his duty to share his faith and since he didn’t have to worry too much about formal Catholic school for his own children, that freed him up to share his faith with the children of other families.

I bring up this example right now because we are looking at starting PSR with a minimum of catechists and all our volunteers are students at Truman. At this time, especially in the circumstances of the pandemic, we have a great opportunity to expand the understanding of our obligation to provide religious education for all our children.

This is what it means to “tithe our first fruits.” Yes, we give because there is a need that requires support. But even before that is the obligation to share as the proper expression of gratitude for God’s blessings. Tithing our first fruits of time, talent and treasure is making the best and first portion of who we are and what we have available for the Lord’s work, without conditions or exemptions.

The objective of promoting our Catholic school is worthy and easily attainable. Planning has begun on producing a video showcasing Mary Immaculate School. We are blessed with professionals who do this for a living and I am sure it will be a great production. The more difficult task is to ensure that our promotion isn’t just marketing, but demonstrative of the total commitment our parish has to the mission of Catholic education. That also would include our parish school of religion and it could even include the radical step of allotting a proportionate share  of our time, talent and treasure to our high school youth as we do for those in grade school.

Evangelium Gaudium says this: “[Involvement] often remains tied to tasks within the Church, without a real commitment to applying the Gospel to the transformation of society.” The true test of whether or not we succeed in promoting our Catholic school is not a rise in enrollment, although that certainly is a worthy objective. It isn’t even the success of our graduates, although that certainly is a sign that we are doing something right. The true test is how our alumni transform the world around them into a society reflective of the Gospel. We can’t stop at just producing good Catholics. The real goal is as it always has been, to bring the person and message of Christ into the world by what we say and do so that others may know and encounter the living God in their midst.