The perils of "preferred peers"
On Catholic campuses that aspire to Top Ten or Top Twenty status in publicity sweepstakes like the "U.S. News and World Report" college rankings, one sometimes hears the phrase "preferred peers."
On Catholic campuses that aspire to Top Ten or Top Twenty status in publicity sweepstakes like the "U.S. News and World Report" college rankings, one sometimes hears the phrase "preferred peers."
The first time I read aloud to one of my children, the experience ended in tears.
The first sight that met my eyes when my father turned onto Nassau Street was the high Gothic tower of the Commons, where we freshmen and sophomores of Princeton University would take our meals.
Animating virtue is tough work and it requires everyone staying on-mission.
Our Catholic schools exist to serve the Church's mission of sanctification and evangelization.
Papal interventions and Roman documents repeatedly emphasize that certain characteristics must be present for a school to be considered authentically Catholic.
You do not read good books so that you can scramble up some tricksy you learn about the language and about what writers do, but because they are companions who will tell you what they have seen of the truth, and they tell you it in a way you will not soon forget.
There are many reasons given for higher education, but how many of them take seriously ultimate questions and the permanent things?
Human beings, given the right support, tend to rise to meet high expectations. Chastity is difficult, but so is most of what is truly worthwhile in life. It is time for all of us, schools and parents, to raise the bar.