School of Love and Service: A Prayer for the Preservation of Catholic Schools

Oh star of Christ, streaming from the heavens, pour out your light,

Igniting love, enflaming unity, raising and rising us above our differences, delighting to bring us together, healing our hurts –

Shine out in silence, speak a word to be heard in the deepest recesses Of our hearts, calling us to celebrate your many gifts, give us the joy of welcoming you: educating us to love-in-truth: the truth-in-love!

Oh, Joseph and Mary, you are deeply intertwined in the roots

Of your people, immersed in the sacred ground of the history

Of salvation which, intensely present in the religious rites

Of the people of God, feed the very life of the child Jesus,

Born of the Virgin Mary and foster fathered by Joseph.

You taught him to pray, to read and to listen to the word of God,

Sharing with the child the great events and places of salvation history, Helping Him to find the unfolding of who He is in the Writings, Forming Him through your welcome of others into family life and The overflow of good works which poured out from within you.

Holy Family of Nazareth, school and cultural ground of the Lord,

Help us to begin anew the nourishing of the life of faith in the family,

Both within your people and beyond to the shores of the earth, in the School, the university and the widespread social influences so present

And a part of the times in which we live, from beginning to end.

Oh Lord our God, forgive our abandonment of your life,

The destruction of lives, the hidden corruption of the heart

That spilled into despoiling the vulnerable years of others.

Open again the treasures of your love and let your mercy

Pour through the wounds of our times and refresh, beautify,

Made richly splendid in the transfiguration of your Church.

Oh Holy Family, come amidst the families of our time, raising up

Vocations, training centres, growing out of the transmission of work,

Like Mary and Joseph opened up for you and those around you, Burgeoning into all the professions, walks and ways of life, arising,

Springing out in full vigour from the mysterious fullness of God.

Oh great Shepherd and Teacher of all, renew in song, singing as you Did the psalms and promises of the great events of your appearing And passing among us, guide, inspire, rebuild the multifaceted works Of education and training, bringing fresh faces and graces to walk Upon the difficulties of today, colourfully answering our questions.

Oh silence of God, speak to us, exhausted as we are with images, activity, and words flooding the earth, that we might hear your still Small voice and fuel, time and again, the great and greater needs of The peoples of the earth, falling behind and beneath the oppressively Impossible burdens of almost no wages, food, water or support.

So let the genius of schools, the generosity of your gifts, the gathering Of your community, be like a dynamo, driving a multiplicity of Talents into tools, whether to work in the home, in training or in the discoveries and inventions still to be made, sending out servants of The poor to resource and progress what teaches us to turn to you.

by Francis Etheredge Profiles in Catholicism

“Catholic education gives soul to our globalized world and radiates the promise of Christian salvation.”

by Pope Francis