The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1920-06-19
THE TRIUMPHANT MARCH OF
OUR CATHOLIC SCHOOLS.

Time and again has the reproach
been flung in the face of Catholics that
the secular colleges and State schools
are far superior to our Catholic in
situations, that our schools are behind
the age, our methods old and worn out
and unsuited to this progressive era,
and that our Catholic teachers may
and sing hymns, but our education
stops there; we do not know how to
teach them to meet the practical
duties of life, how to succeed in the
business world, how to take part in
the great onward march of progress
that is sweeping the world and all
before it, and in which every man and
woman must play their part or go
down in the maelstrom of defeat and
failure.
This hue and cry, on a par with
that heard so often before the world
war, that Catholics were lacking in
patriotism, that if our country called
and the Pope said mo" they would
obey the Pope and dishonor our coun-
try, is meeting the same refutation as
the latter The great part that Cath
olics played in the late war, the patri-
otism with which they responded
everywhere to the call of their coun-
try and rallied beneath it's flag and
were commended for so doing by the
Pope himself, were revelation to the
enemies of the Church. Here, in this
great free land of America, the ex-
ample set by our Catholic laity and
by Bishops and priests, in the great
movements which they inspired and
carried to success for God and country,
the fact that Catholics furnished, &C
cording to the national authoritative
statistics, forty per cent of the Army
and sixty per cent of the Navy, that
they hesitated not in their sublime
efforts to lay down their lives in
the Argonne forests, on the Marine, in
the training camps and hospitals, or
to go over the top in the patriotic
drives to help on the great cause,
silenced the voices of their critics.
Never again can the reprOach be flung
at Catholics in these United States
that they would not do their duty if
their country called.
And now another time-worn accusa-
ton is being refuted and nailed on the
head, as it were, and this is the half
century-old falsehood that Catholic
education is a failure, and cannot com.
pete nor compare with the efforts put
forward by educators in the State
schools and secular colleges and acad-
emies. AS Catholics we knew the SUI
perior value of schools, we knew the
splendid training intellectually, moral
ly and spiritually that our children re-
ceived; we knew the ability of our
teachers; we knew, above all, that the
purpose of Catholic education was not
only to fit our children for their duties
as citizens of this great Republic in
time, but for the Inheritance of the
Kingdom of God. And for years we
patiently bore that taunt, knowing that
when children did leave our schools
for attendance at the public and Sc.
cular schools it was only the refuse.
or poorest pupils who could not learn
anywhere who left our ranks; the
better part stayed on, to uphold the
banner of Catholic education and to
labor for the upbuilding of the Repub-
lie and true Christian manhood and
womanhood in America.
There were among our educators,
however, some who thought that we
should refute the slrirs which those
ignorant of our work sought to heap
upon us and that our Catholic schools
should come forward and wherever the
opportunity offered compete publicly
with the State and secular schools and
demonstrate our ability; that we yield
ed to none the palm of superiority in
training methods or results.
For several years these public con.
tests have been held in the North
East and West, and everywhere, when
our Catholic schools have entered the
ranks, our pupils have carried off the
palm of victory. -4a . -.
The recent Army Essay Contests, in
which all the schools throughout the
North, East and West, public, private
and parochial, participated, was in
deed, it may be said, a revelation to-
educators in the United States, in the
great majority of the prizes won by
Catholic school pupils. .". ..
Last month, for the first time in the;
history of Catholic education in the
Archdiocese of New Orleans, the pupils
of our Catholic parochial schools en-
tered into a public contest with the.
pupils of the public schools in an his
torical essay contest, arranged by the
New Orleans Chapter of the United
Daughters of the Confederacy. Every
public school entered the contest. The
results were told last week. The first
four prizes were captured by pupils
from our Catholic schools, and one
prize only, and that the fifth, was won
by a public school pupil, the boys
paper being the best submitted out of
258 papers from the public schools.
And it won the fifth prize, our Cath
olic schools leading all the way.
Far be it from The Morning Star to
boast. We are not given to that. We
are simply stating facts as they oc
Cured. The success of our New Or
leans parochial schools in this FIRST