Education

Catholic education is going through a renewal as we realize that we must return to our distinctive tradition in order to face new challenges. We need Catholic schools today more than ever as mainstream education has lost its sanity!

We need the following elements for a renewal of Catholic education:

  1. Renewed Catholic identity, which puts our faith before all else. We need to form disciples, who are ready to serve others and focused on the goal of Heaven.
  2. An integrated curriculum, based on our unique pedagogy of faith and reason and which draws upon the great legacy of Western civilization.
  3. Teaching through poetic knowledge in a way that inspires wonder and helps students to enter into reality by learning through beauty and experience.
  4. Building Catholic culture by living out what we learn about our faith in the world. We must initiate our students into the living tradition of the Catholic faith and teach them to live their faith in all that they do.

Christopher Dawson proposed the renewal of Catholic education through an immersion into the living reality of Christian culture. Simply teaching abstract truths about the faith will not lead our students to living as Christians in a secular world. Rather, we need to form their imagination and mind together, help them to see themselves as part of an ongoing story and adventure, and give them a sense of their own mission within it. I brought this vision into two talks for teachers of the Archdiocese of Denver to help reconnect Catholic education to is roots. The first is a crash course on Catholic history, emphasizing the Church’s role in Western education. The second looks at why beauty is so important for education in inspiring our students to what is highest.

Here also is a video where I describe the legacy of one great teacher John Senior, who embodied the principles of integration, poetic knowledge, and culture in his teaching within the Integrated Humanities Program at the University of Kansas.

Teacher Training

I have developed the following training sessions for teachers to share this vision of education.

Catholic Worldview Seminar: A four day seminar that engages the four pillars of the Catechism and shows how they shape a Catholic curriculum.

The Art of Catechesis: An eight part free online series about how to teach the Catholic faith.

The Importance of the Liberal Arts: A one day session for educators on how to transmit the Catholic tradition of the liberal arts and culture.

Becoming a Spiritual Leader: This workshop focuses on how to pray with students and use religious education to help to become disciples.

High School

I have also helped found a high school that embodies these principles in Littleton, CO, The Chesterton Academy of Our Lady of Victory, and am currently helping to establish the Chesterton Academy of St. John Paul II.

Resources