I spent 17 years of my life in classrooms with a crucifix on the wall, and three others in teaching them. No wonder, then, I have some clear ideas about the closures announced last week by the Archdiocese.
Some of them may actually be printed in this document.
It 'hard for me, having grown up in a time when Catholic education was valued, to accept a strong presence of Catholic schools are no longer needed in Philadelphia. If it were, we would not even crying children on the steps of their schools to be closed soon, a newly appointed Archbishop hands squeeze the ineptitude of his predecessors and masters who bypassed lucrative contracts Public schools are now asking if they are also a work in September.
It seems so preventable carnage visible. Of course, I am not a Number Cruncher, and could not begin to offer alternatives to the crushing wave of closures. But I do not see how this same year announced tragedy, and with the help of those who speak of others, could have been avoided.
Catholic schools in the generation of my parents and, to some extent, mine were community projects. While rarely agree with Hillary Clinton in his first incarnation, ma'am, I bought the concept in his book It Takes a Village, where the author has shown how the children were not only the responsibility of those who gave rise to them but also of those who lived in their neighborhood, sitting on benches or at the temple next to them, played with them, sold the grocery store, coached their teams and, most importantly, they taught.
Children who wore skirts and saddle shoes walked to their neighborhood schools, she went home for lunch and defined the boundaries of their world with the names of saints and holy men: Hubert Goretti, Hallahan, Kenrick, Egan, Neumann, Little Flower. They knew that other children of the public who attended the school on 1 November and 8 December. Have pity, although envied their ability to wear "normal" clothes and their ability to prevent a monopoly of fish sticks in the cafeteria.
But, as the fabric lay loose, and families became less coherent as the largest Catholic community. Obviously, the vast majority of the faithful in Philadelphia continued to send their money and their children in the archdiocese, in part because they wanted to and partly because they had no choice. Private schools are too expensive or too much (and too arrogant), while the city's public schools began to be rather risky. I mean, we can talk all we want about Central and Masterman, but given the choice between a snap of the fingers by a nun and a knife to the throat of a classmate, the choice was easy for most Catholics (and even non-Catholics -) parents.
But a growing number of people decided that they prefer to spend their money elsewhere, even this relatively modest sum that was the archdiocese has asked for teaching. And then you had people who have decided that the church did not deserve the money because, as we all know, was a haven for pedophiles, homophobes and hate women. And there were always those who do not want their children indoctrinated by the "religious nuts" and preferred to send their grandchildren to parents Nice places where secular distribute condoms in vending machines.
I heard that it is not just a problem of culture war. It 'true. It is a lack of common sense, God and Caesar. Taking a total confusion and the tragic abuse scandal, the Church has not only lost its moral superiority, but he made sure that lawyers are beginning to emerge from their claws unsheathed, ready to sue at the drop of a miter . You can not convince me that some of the schools targeted for closing would not have been saved if a settlement of millions of dollars had not been paid for Altar Boy Doe.
And the secular governments that are so obsessed with the wall between church and state, one made of imaginary bricks constitutional hear the cries of the secularists and coupons to make sure to block every possible angle. When you realize that the Catholic school system has saved the city's resources, we understand that the only reason that could have opposed vouchers was a suicide fear religious indoctrination.
It feels like a tide flooded Philadelphia, sweeping generations of good things and memories of loved ones: my mother's alma mater, West Catholic, Saint-Hubert, the Rock of the north-east; Take and Bonner, in my backyard .
Do not have an answer. Only tears.
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