2/21/25 - Friday Forget-Me-Nots by Jim Silcott

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Dear Our Lady of Peace Family,

Our Lady of Peace is celebrating our own Catholic Schools Week beginning this weekend and next week. We went rogue in not participating in the national week at the end of January because we had missed four days of school for weather. We celebrated that Catholic Schools Week by having a solid week of education! 

Catholic schools have a rich history in the United States for being independent from government control and emphasizing a rigorous education combined with an adherence to our Catholic faith. Our system of American Catholic schools began in earnest in 1852 when the Bishops of the United States met in Baltimore, Maryland to discuss the prejudice of the public school system against Catholics. With a country of growing immigrants, mostly European and mostly Catholic, a movement called Americanism became a rallying point of folks scared about the influx of those coming into our country who, they thought, held a slavish devotion to the Pope rather than to democracy. Catholics were called by the derogatory term “Papists.” 

The thought of those who ran the public school system in America was that their duty to educate these “filthy immigrants,” included indoctrinating them to protestant religions, which were an essential part of public schools back then. They insisted that the protestant bible be freely taught in their schools. Although there is not a lot of difference between the two, public school leaders wanted all traces of Roman Catholicism stamped out in America. There was even an anti-Catholic riot in 1844 in Philadelphia where hundreds of Catholics were killed or wounded. 

So, in 1852 the bishops decreed that a Catholic school be instituted in every parish in the United States and that it was the duty of all Catholic families to attend these schools instead of public institutions. There students could be taught the Catholic faith, prepare for the sacraments, freely express our devotion to Mary and use the Catholic bible. The Baltimore Catechism, with its concise summary of Catholic doctrine, became a staple in Catholic schools continuing into the 1960’s/. 

Not only did our schools teach the faith to millions of Catholic youths, but the sisters who undertook the task, decided that along with religion, the parochial schools would provide excellence in education. This rigor became the standard for our schools and continues to this day. 

Although the mandate that every Catholic parish have a school was never fully realized and indeed many Catholic schools have closed, the basic principles by which they were founded have not changed. We unapologetically teach the Catholic faith, and we insist upon an education that challenges our students to academic excellence. We also continue to be a place for diverse immigrants who cherish the Catholic faith. While the number of non-Catholics has grown in our schools, we have not watered down or minimized any of our values and we have conversions to our faith on a regular basis. 

One of the most significant and positive changes in Catholic schools has been the inclusion of students with special needs. We believe that each student is a child is a child of God, entitled to learn and to grow, and to be given the tools needed to succeed in life.

At Our Lady of Peace, we are proud to be one of the many wonderful institutions in our Diocese who strive each and every day to be wonderful places of love and learning and prayer and sacraments and daily religion class. And we recognize that “When two or more are gathered in My Name, there I am in the midst of them.” 

Jim Silcott