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Catholic Schools Week Heats Up in Bismarck, ND

Posted February 9th, 2011 | Uncategorized

Krakow in December 1996, topped the coldest place I visited. Bismarck, ND in January comes at a close second!

Bismarck's Capital Building. People joked with me about the beautiful Bismarck Skyline! Sorry for the blurry pic, as I was in a moving car.

As the plane touched down, I saw the icy snow blowing back and forth. The airline attendant said that our hand carried bags cannot be brought to the gate because their baggage apparatus was frozen. As soon as I stepped off the plane I felt that instant chill through my bones, my frozen nasal passages, and the shivering came instantly. What was I doing in Bismark, ND in January?!?

Me with some of the members of the Schweiters' Family. All of the children were alumnus of St. Mary's High School

I had been invited to help kick off Catholic Schools week at St. Mary’s Central Catholic HS by giving a talk to the students, speaking at each classroom and hosting an event with the parents. My presentations came complete with breakdancing, board breaking and bread breaking!

From a Youth Rally in Florida - Teaching kids how to "break through" the barriers that prevent us from growing closer to God

It was definitely worth the cold! I’m very proud to recognize this St. Mary’s Central High School as one of the most outstanding Catholic High Schools that I’ve visited! And yes, I do tons of talks for different school systems across our great country and this is truly one of the best! This school has several “walls of fame”, but the most impressive wall proudly displayed all of the different religious vocations that have come from the school since 1916. And they continue to produce more. That’s impressive as it is!

A Wall of Priests and Religious Vocations from One High School. Impressive!

When I arrived, the students and some teachers were still in the hallways as the announcements began. Right before the bell rang for first period, they all prayed the Angelus - by memory – and they all even genuflected at the proper time of the prayer.

Pausing for Prayer - and not just saying words. They really prayed at this High School.

I also discovered that all of the religion teachers were male. They had nothing against women teachers, and in fact seek them out. They recently had one female religion teacher until she left to raise her family. I guess Bismarck is just a tad more traditional than big cities, and for that reason, they thrive in their Catholic Identity. I find this impressive because it’s hard to find male role models of faith. In some cases there is an agenda, a more liberalized feminized version of religion that creeps into Catholic Faith Formation. That cannot be! In a modern world where religious education is primarily done by women (and thank God for moms and faithful female teachers!), that sometimes means that faith is taught to the exclusion of dads – the fatherly figure. While I have no hard statistic on this, I can say that the schools that have males as teachers for religious education have a stronger sense of Catholic Identity. It’s the same as a family. When dads get involved in the faith, the children are more sincere, accepting and practicing than when the mother exclusively teaches the faith. In some cases, the mothers do it because dads aren’t interested or available. Again, no disrespect for female teachers and a mother’s approach to faith. I’m simply suggesting we need to have BOTH – men and women teaching the faith, and not just one or the other.

"Know Your Faith" Championship Trophy. This Catholic Quiz Competition is SERIOUS and Serious FUN stuff for these students!

This school should be very proud of the “fatherly character” that comes from their religious school classes. I can tell that even the tougher HS boys were more authentic in their faith, simply because they had such good, manly, and Christian gentlemen as role models.

Fr. Waltz, school chaplain. A good spiritual father. He's a real outdoorsman, but also likes sushi! Sushi, in Bismarck? Hear all about it in an upcoming blast!

I found the chaplaincy program quite effective, relevant, and vibrant as well. They obviously have Catholic Identity as a hallmark for this school – even calling their sport teams, “Saints!” You can’t go wrong with that.

Catholic Schools week is a great time to celebrate the dignity and honor of raising your children in the Catholic School System. I am very impressed and edified by the number of schools, like St. Mary’s, that takes the religious identity very seriously. Authentic Catholic education doesn’t hinder social development. Some suggest that Catholic education doesn’t help a young person integrate well into mainstream society. That couldn’t be farther from the truth. I’ve found these St. Mary’s students to be quite impressive future leaders. The ones I met demonstrated virtue, intelligence, athleticism, kindness. They were normal, funny – dare I say it – COOL!

Some of the students serving as sous chefs! These students were big foodies too - an "A +" in my book!

On the flip side, I’ve been to schools where I wonder if the parents know how much money they were wasting on education. Classrooms were sloppy, the teachers were whiney, and the Catholic Identity was fluffy – nothing substantial – nothing to be proud of! Discipline in such schools pander close to psycho-babble-affirmations; Uniform and dress codes weren’t followed as boys walked around with drooping pants while girls hiked up their skirts leaving very little to imagination. Catholic Identity for some schools showed up once a week – during Catholic School’s Week. Admittedly, there are some very sad Catholic Schools. Dear Bishops – close these down or make them take away the name “Catholic!” Or, even better, recruit a strong religious order to take over, and employ nothing but the best teachers that come from my University 0 Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, or other places like Steubenville, Christendom, Aquinas College and a few other really good Catholic Colleges and Universities!

This blog is an invitation for parents to be more invested in their children’s education. Education is FOOD FOR THE MIND! We need more of a wake up call for those schools that call themselves Catholic. They need to celebrate their Catholic Identity more than once a week. They need to be more authentic and to live out their faith more fully, joyfully, and regularly. If they do, they will excel in enrollment and their students will excel in life. I just read an article about how Catholic School students best in academic competitions. Happy as I am about that statistic, those statistical numbers should be much higher than reported!

One of the most edifying things about this Catholic School’s week at St. Mary’s High School happened after the closing bell rang of the first day. The chaplain and administration invited parents of the students to come to a Grace Before Meals demonstration so that I can share our message about the domestic church – the family’s role in educating their children. So many parents came! We almost ran out of food. I definitely ran out of books and aprons. It was so great to see so many families come together to learn from the dinner table and not just the desk table.

Check out the crowds waiting in line for the food! I guess this could be considered a communion of "saints".

The students who helped me cook for this event were just as impressive as they were helpful. After meeting some of their parents, I can see why! The best Catholic Schools don’t simply rely on the chaplain, the principal or the teachers. These successful Catholic Schools rely on the parents as the primary (not exclusive) educators. In other words, you can have the best Catholic School system, but without parents getting involved, the program will suffer.

Perhaps this is also another wake up call – not just for schools, but for parents – to make sure that education requires information for the mind but also authentic inspiration of the Holy Spirit for heart and soul! We can’t leave God or His Catholic Church out of authentic education. We need to be more disciples (i.e., disciplined students) that come from disciplined homes and more obedient school systems.

St. Mary’s Central Catholic High School, thank you for helping restore my faith in the Catholic School Education System. While it was cold as “Bismarck in January”, you all definitely warmed my spirit with your on-fire faith!

Class of 2011 - Catholic School's Week's "Beach Day" - in North Dakota? Congratulations and Blessings on your Graduation!

Class of 2011 - Catholic Schools Week. Students celebrating "Beach Day." In North Dakota?!?! Congratulations and Blessings on your Graduation!

Tell me your opinion about Catholic schools. Are they different now from back in your time? What can Catholic Schools do to improve and stay true to their name as “Catholic?” Are you proud and pleased with your Catholic School? If so, tell us the name and where it is. Maybe someone in your area is looking for a good school. At this table, your comments are very welcome and important to us! Post your comments below.

Posted in Uncategorized | 8 Comments

8 Responses to “Catholic Schools Week Heats Up in Bismarck, ND”

Fr. Leo, Thank you for coming to Bismarck, ND and sharing your gifts and your love for Christ with us. You wrote a wonderful article and thank you for speaking the truth about some catholic schools not staying strong in our “catholic identity”. We are so impressed with our religious education program at St. Mary’s and my husband and I believe sending our four children to St. Mary’s has been one of the best choices we have made in our life and money well spent. I graduated from St. Mary’s many years ago and the religious ed program has come a very long way. Our teachers speak the truth about our catholic faith and our children love to hear the truth even though the truth can be hard to live. They truly are reinforcing what we are teaching them at home. It truly is a great school. God Bless you and all your good works.
Posted by Lynn Fischer on February 11th, 2011 at 2:19 pm.
My pleasure and would be an honor to return, even with 2 feet of snow and 20 below! Blessings.
Posted by Fr. Leo on February 12th, 2011 at 3:56 am.
We were sure glad to have you come and freeze in Bismarck with us! Thank you so much for the kind words in your blog. I think that St. Mary’s has one of the finest teaching staffs out there, and it was nice to see that acknowledged!
I am one of the cooks, and my daughter attends the school. She was very impressed with your talks! In this day and age of computer games, video games, cell phones, etc. . . anyone that can keep her attention MUST be super impressive! So thanks again for coming!
God Bless your travels!
Posted by Fr. Leo on February 12th, 2011 at 4:35 am.
What a wonderful recap of your visit to ND – too bad we couldn’t turn up the temp a bit. It was great to have you at St. Mary’s – We have been blessed with several dynamic young priests/men as chaplains at our school and they have touched our kids for life with their Faith and their humanity. You too have left your mark. Thanks for the awesome message. PS the food was good too!
Posted by Gail Lengenfelder on February 15th, 2011 at 6:28 pm.
As a parent of one former and one current St. Mary’s student, I can tell you that there is something very special going on at the school. The students, faculty, and parents know it and I believe that the community is becoming more and more aware of the overwhelmingly positive environment that it prevalent at St. Mary’s. Thank you for visiting and please keep the school in your prayers.
Posted by Steve Klabo on February 22nd, 2011 at 10:47 pm.
Dear Fr. Leo – what a WONDERFUL posting on your visit to St. Mary’s High School! My husband and I will be sending our oldest child to St. Mary’s next year (God-willing!) Your blog is another “sign” that we NEED to send our kids there! You asked about other Catholic schools that we are pleased with… 3 of our 5 children currently attend St. Anne’s Grade School in Bismarck… I canNOT even begin to tell you how grateful we are to have our children attend St. Anne’s! I went there as a child and had 4 nuns as teachers in my 8 years there. But I can honestly say this: the teachers that are there NOW (none of them nuns or priests) – ENSURE our children receive a Catholic education! My 8th grader knows so much more about his faith than I EVER did (even into my adult life). The pastor of St. Anne’s church, Fr. Ed Wehner, visits the school regularly. He prays for them and he brings them meaningful gifts when he travels and during various holiday seasons. Fr. Tom Richter talks to our confirmation class every Thursday – he is a young priest – with a beautiful heart full of passion for our Lord! We have weekly school masses (grades 1-8 lead the masses by providing music with our AWESOME music teacher, proclaiming the readings, and carrying up the gifts during presentation). Having our children at St. Anne’s is worth EVERY penny that we have sacrificed to send them there!! (In regards to that: Fr. Ed is very adamant that every young Catholic child should have a Catholic education, so he has provided a “fair share” tuition, where families can decide how much they can afford towards tuition. If it were not for this beautiful man, our children would not be at St. Anne’s.) SO… if you’re ever in Bismarck again, please join us at St. Anne’s!! God bless you, Fr. Leo – and thank you again for your uplifting words!!
Posted by Carol Letteer on March 10th, 2011 at 8:05 am.
Fr. Leo, My family is a member of Saint Anne Parish in Bismarck, ND. My children attended St. Anne School from pre-school to grade 8. They attended and graduated from St. Mary’s High School, so they were educated in the Catholic school system for 13 years. We were so fortunate to have them educated in our Catholic schools and we believe too that it was worth every penny! Both schools were wonderful. They enjoyed and learned in small class sizes. They knew every person that passed in the hallway on a personal basis. We loved the dedication of the teachers and how they put their heart and soul into the students at St. Annes and SMCHS. Because of their fine teachers, they have never had a question unanswered and they always had support when something went wrong. However, all this pales in comparison to the REAL reason that Catholic schools exist-and that is CHRIST. Everyday they entered an environment like none they had ever known. Each morning their school community joined together in prayer-learning about the life of a saint and praying together The Angelus. They have all school masses and each student has the chance to attend Eucharistic Adoration, as it takes place everyday over the lunch period in the chapel. In addition, students have the chance to learn and grow in their faith through daily religion classes. My children’s favorite class each year that they benefited most from was their religion class. In religion class, whether it was the Old Testament, Morality, Intro to the Principles of Catholic Social Teaching, or World Religions, they learned about how to live their lives to the fullest. To us, being spiritually fed everyday at a Catholic School is priceless! Not only are religion classes great, but their general classes are as well. Academics are challenging, and college preparation is evident. But, Christ knows no boundaries. He is the essential part of the entire academic curriculum. He is in the band room when they ask for His grace before a concert; he is at every athletic event when they ask Him in prayer for guidance and safety. Christ is also present outside the classroom. Our schools have Jeans Days that raise funds for many organizations such as the God’s Child Project. They have organizations such as the Leo Lions service club, Knights of Virtue, Fellowship of Christian Athletics, Little Flowers of Christ and many more. Students have amazing opportunities to work with the poor and build homes for them in Guatemala with the God’s Child Project. What a life long learning experience to help and to see how the poorest of the poor live. Each year the seniors have the opportunity to go on he annual senior pilgrimage to Rome lead by the Religion teachers and priests. St. Mary’s and St. Anne schools are much more than a high school and grade school. Our children are so grateful that we sacrificed and made the choice to send them to Catholic schools. The schools-in their activities, their classes, their teachers and staff- has set an example for them of good Catholic Christian living in a world that is often quite the opposite. We feel our children are prepared for the challenges that lie ahead in life and feel always thankful for their time at St. Annes and St. Mary’s. Next time you visit Bismarck, please stop by Saint Anne School. It is Bismarck’s BEST kept secret!!! Sandy Kienzle
Posted by Sandy Kienzle on March 10th, 2011 at 10:48 pm.
Someone mentioned this post at dinner last night (appropriately), so I needed to find and read it. This is a wonderful tribute, with one objection. I have a lot of affection for Fr. Leo, a good friend from seminary, and I treated him to his first visit to St. Mary’s HS back when I was still chaplain there. But in his list of “really good Catholic colleges and universities”, he forgets his buddy up the hill, and that makes me a little grumpy: http://www.cometomary.com God bless your work good work with young people and beyond, Fr. Leo.
Posted by Father James Shea on March 11th, 2011 at 9:47 am.

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