Articles
Still Here, Still Working Hard
Now that the holidays are behind us it’s good to reflect on the gifts that come our way through God’s grace. St. Patrick School has been a source of God’s grace for me and I would love to share a piece of the “grace pie”. I am a life-long Catholic raised by converts to the faith. My parents became Catholic when I was a baby. My mother was raised Jewish and my father in the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ, so the joke could go, “ What do you get when you cross a Jew with a Mormon?.... A Catholic.” In all seriousness, my parents did feel the sting of racism because of their faiths growing up. If we were all to live by the truth of our belief in Jesus Christ the outcome would never be racism.
St. Patrick school was formed over 100 years ago to serve the educational needs of mostly Irish immigrants who came to Springfield, IL to work in the coal mines. The Irish immigrants were marginalized in society and lived with the scourge of racism, and it’s interesting to me that this school is now serving the needs of another segment of society that has suffered cruelly at the hands of racism. With the change of the neighborhoods surrounding St. Patrick School we now serve the spiritual and educational needs of African American students. Our student population is 90% black and mostly non-catholic. Does this change our mission?
Our mission, and I mean yours and mine, on a daily basis is to be disciples of Christ. Each school that is listed in this article has the same goal, to bring children up in a Godly fashion. To help build the whole of society up through meeting the spiritual and educational needs of the children we serve. Christ’s mission begins in the heart of each person that reads this article. It is a daily choice to make ourselves better, more Christ-like, and then take that spirit to everyone we encounter during the day. I do not care if these kids are Catholic right now because when they are older and the goodness that they have learned at St. Patrick School will be a light reflected through their life and that is what Christ desires. St. Patrick School is a source of Grace to all those students who walk through our front door every day.
Judi Willard, Development Director St. Patrick School
Now that the holidays are behind us it’s good to reflect on the gifts that come our way through God’s grace. St. Patrick School has been a source of God’s grace for me and I would love to share a piece of the “grace pie”. I am a life-long Catholic raised by converts to the faith. My parents became Catholic when I was a baby. My mother was raised Jewish and my father in the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ, so the joke could go, “ What do you get when you cross a Jew with a Mormon?.... A Catholic.” In all seriousness, my parents did feel the sting of racism because of their faiths growing up. If we were all to live by the truth of our belief in Jesus Christ the outcome would never be racism.
St. Patrick school was formed over 100 years ago to serve the educational needs of mostly Irish immigrants who came to Springfield, IL to work in the coal mines. The Irish immigrants were marginalized in society and lived with the scourge of racism, and it’s interesting to me that this school is now serving the needs of another segment of society that has suffered cruelly at the hands of racism. With the change of the neighborhoods surrounding St. Patrick School we now serve the spiritual and educational needs of African American students. Our student population is 90% black and mostly non-catholic. Does this change our mission?
Our mission, and I mean yours and mine, on a daily basis is to be disciples of Christ. Each school that is listed in this article has the same goal, to bring children up in a Godly fashion. To help build the whole of society up through meeting the spiritual and educational needs of the children we serve. Christ’s mission begins in the heart of each person that reads this article. It is a daily choice to make ourselves better, more Christ-like, and then take that spirit to everyone we encounter during the day. I do not care if these kids are Catholic right now because when they are older and the goodness that they have learned at St. Patrick School will be a light reflected through their life and that is what Christ desires. St. Patrick School is a source of Grace to all those students who walk through our front door every day.
Judi Willard, Development Director St. Patrick School
Saint Pat's is Back on Track
by Patrick Yeagle of the Illinois Times Struggling St. Pat's may have . . .
by Rhys Saunders of the The State Journal-Register
by Rhys Saunders of the The State Journal-Register