May 19, 2022
Crowning Mary: A May Tradition by Joseph Pronechen at National Catholic Register, For many decades, the lovely words and melody of the hymn “Bring Flowers of the Rarest” have been gracing the beautiful traditional crowning of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The ceremony has been held in countless parishes, schools and homes throughout the world. “The crowning is symbolic of Mary as Queen of Heaven and of our lives,” Father John Broussard, rector of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Good Help in Champion, Wisconsin, explained to the Register. “We entrust all our intentions to her, and she takes them to her Son, who is the King. Even here at the shrine, when she appeared to Adele Brise [in 1859] at the opening of the apparitions, she said, ‘I am the Queen of Heaven who prays for the conversion of sinners.’” Read Why a Maryland School's 53-Year-Old Program is one of the Best Ideas in Catholic Education Today by Kimberly Begg at Catholic School Playbook. “If you walk into the school chapel on any given morning, you will see many boys spending quiet time with the Blessed Sacrament,” says Joe Cardenas. This is not the result of a mandatory prayer policy, but a 53-year-old program that helps students choose the good by engaging teachers in the formation of students in a personal way. Read Parents Say Public Schools Make ‘Gender Identity’ Decisions forThem Without Telling Them by Matthew McDonald at National Catholic Register. In early March 2021, a sixth-grade social studies teacher informed the parents of an 11-year-old that the student had announced a new gender identity to teachers at school. Later that month, the principal put the teacher on administrative leave for disclosing what had happened at the school to the child’s parents and subsequently fired her. The principal cited “conduct unbecoming a teacher relating to your inappropriate contact with the parents of a student,” according to a federal lawsuit filed last month on behalf of the parents. Read Wisconsin Middle Schoolers Accused of Sexual Harassment for using Wrong Pronouns by Jeremiah Poff at Washington Examiner. Three students at a Wisconsin middle school are facing allegations of sexual harassment under Title IX after they repeatedly refused to use “they/them” pronouns when addressing a fellow student. Read Finding Refuge at the University of Dallas by Joshua T. Katz at First Things. The prevailing tribe at UD is conservative Catholics, who have never dominated the scene at Princeton or any of the other fancy institutions with which I have been associated. At no point in recent memory would anyone have expected to find in most dorm rooms at Princeton the items I saw in both student residences I visited during my twenty-four hours at UD: a well-thumbed Bible, a cross, and a biography of Patrick Kavanaugh. At no point at Princeton in recent memory would a main line of conversation over brunch have been renderings of Psalm 90 into different languages and Lincoln’s allusion to it in the Gettysburg Address. Read Throwback Thursday A Case for School Choice: What is Education For? Is it for the Student, or is it for the School? by John Grondelski at National Catholic Register on December 22, 2021. The question that has always been lurking in the background is: what is education for? Is it for the student, or is it for the school? If the former, then any school the state deems imparting an education that meets its schooling requirements (and no state can outlaw religious schools — Pierce v. Society of Sisters) is suitable for the student and deserves educational support. In other words, the choice is the student’s, and impairing that choice is discriminatory. If the latter, then we’ve embraced the bizarre notion that the subject of education is a thing — a school — and students are simply animate furniture moving in and out of it. Read