Communion and Vulnerability

In the spring, I typically give one to two tours a week to prospective families. A question I receive frequently is: "What makes your school different from a public school?"

So what does make a Catholic school different? What makes Saint Joseph different?

In a state where the LGBTQ agenda is now being extended to Kindergarten, the first thing that sets us apart is: Faith. It is from faith that our difference markers grow. We are firmly rooted in the conviction that our education is not temporal but eternal, does not prepare one for only the next sixty years but for an eternity with Christ.

It is because of that faith that we demand two things that I will focus on today: communion and vulnerability.

Communion is the gathering together of all of our disparate pieces - our staff, our students, our families, our parish - and the idea that we come together with each other with a focus on knowing, supporting, loving each other as individuals.

Vulnerability is what allows us to break down the walls that normally arise between us and allows our communion to begin.

At Saint Joseph School, we are far from a vision of communion. But there is that vision. To pull that plan into reality, I need to ensure that I am consistently modeling that vulnerability, that I am sharing, that I am listening. So that in my actions I can build that communion, that coming together.

In a year that began with the death of a student parent, that saw the loss of a staff member, that has its fair-share of normal and abnormal ups and downs, my hope is that there was never a feeling of aloneness, of apartheid, of separation and severing from the community as a whole.

In his fantastic novella, The Great Divorce, Lewis depicts Hell as an interminable plain, where each individual, rooted in their selfishness, moves further from the rest; increasingly isolating his- or her-self. If we are seeking to form the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth, than we are called to come together, to form communion, to support each other, to buttress the weaknesses and weakest, and to recognize and utilize the strengths and strongest. It is in our vulnerability and openness to each other that we can form a truly strong community.