In February, St. Joseph Preparatory High School announced their doors would close for good at the end of the school year. The Brighton, MA institution had occupied the former Mount Saint Joseph Academy and was the result of a 2012 merger between that school and Trinity Catholic High School of Newton, MA which was founded in 1894.
In March, the all-girls Mount Alvernia High School (also in Newton) announced plans to close and merge with Fontbonne Academy, another all-girls Catholic school in Milton, MA. The Missionary Franciscan Sisters who ran Mount Alvernia said operations had become unsustainable because they were no longer able to continue living on the property. According to a National Catholic Register article, one board member who later became its chair said the possibility of closing the school "was never once discussed" during her tenure and she accused the sisters of making their decision in secret.
Students of the Cambridge Matignon School were also blindsided when the 76 year old Cambridge, MA institution announced their closure just one month before graduation. In all of these cases, the story seems to be the same. Insurmountable financial difficulties coupled with declining enrollment led to each school's demise.
Many years ago, my niece's Catholic school enjoyed huge crowds during their annual Christmas pageant. After just a few years, the place announced its closure as well. Apparently enrollment hadn't dipped...it collapsed and she graduated with only six other students in her class. The principal tried to put a positive spin on things by saying for over a hundred years the institution's mission was to educate young minds and now that mission was complete. We were told to be proud of what the school had accomplished over the past century but such words did little to abate the feeling that something great was being lost.
Sometimes when Catholic schools close, failure is painted as an exciting opportunity. That's how Father Mark Mahoney portrayed the 2016 closure of Saint Mary's School in Beverly, MA. Under his leadership, that institution merged with the nearby Saint John the Evangelist School and was renamed The Saints Academy. There was talk of closing St. Mary's School as early as 1975 but when Father Richard Johnson became pastor a year later, he set up Beano games and took other steps that helped stabilize the school's finances and enrollment. A lot of good people worked so hard over the years to keep that place going. Today, the building continues to sit empty.
Even though this blog has been critical of my experiences at Bishop Fenwick High School, I still feel these institutions are far too important to lose. The parochial educational system offers the Church one of the greatest opportunities to renew itself. Not only are young minds exposed to important character-shaping values, they can also find an oasis from the moral relativism that plagues modern society.
While there are many reasons for these school closures, it certainly doesn't help when young people seeking to increase their faith discover their parishes offer them no place at the table. It also doesn't help when singles who willingly embrace the Church's teachings are left to fend for themselves and never get the chance to marry and have the children who would attend Catholic schools in the first place.
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