In June 2024, following the encouragement of the III International Meeting of the Redemptorist Schools and Colleges in Passo Fundo – Brazil, Notre Dame Catholic School established that the non-academic objective of the academic year 2024-25 would be to consider how to increase Redemptorist formation, charisma in our work. To this end, the efforts of the College are divided into two aspects. One of them is internal, that is, policies that enhance the charisma in the school community, and the other is aimed at those who are not part of the school community. This review considers only the current situation of external efforts. The evaluation of the situation of internal efforts will be reassessed starting in the 1st quarter of the academic year 2024-25.
As we integrate new teachers and students who are unfamiliar with the history that has brought us to this point, it is appropriate to bring some of our history into this analysis of the current state of external efforts.
St. John Neumann’s vision that an education based on the Catholic faith nuanced by the charism of St. Alphonsus and that caring for the poorest and most abandoned was necessary to protect the faith of his parishioners, led him to found schools in his diocese. The pastoral success that the Neumann schools had in Pennsylvania was soon duplicated in other states.
The situation that the Redemptorist missionaries found upon their arrival in Puerto Rico paralleled that experienced by the Bishop of Philadelphia in his diocese, where the Catholic faith of the German, Italian and Irish emigrants was influenced by the Protestant culture in the state schools. This was the example that prompted the North American Redemptorists to found our College in 1916.
At the dawn of the 20th century, Protestant churches in the United States divided Puerto Rico into plots to which they sent their pastors, supporting them with huge economic resources and supported by an anti-Catholic government. This happened almost simultaneously when the vast majority of the clergy of Puerto Rico returned to Spain due to the change of sovereignty from Spain to the United States in 1898. Protected by the vision of protecting the faith, helping the population and facilitating the mission, the Redemptorists founded schools. Time has proven them right.
Today, secularism, the proliferation of Protestant churches, anti-Catholic, or indifferent schools to the Church, as well as the anti-evangelical values that permeate local and global social media, make it necessary to defend the faith of all now, just as in 1916 or perhaps more than in 1916. A well-founded education in the Catholic faith, tinged with the charism of St. Alphonsus, is a response to the challenge of these times.
The devastation of the hurricane at the beginning of the 2017-18 academic year and the impact of the pandemic, which officially ended in May 2023, affected the School’s three programs, School to Work, Service and Apostolate, and San Alfonso Summer Camp, which serve the disadvantaged and marginalized outside of our school community. These were designed to offer help to school dropouts, low-income children, and socially marginalized people outside of school.
We have a strong hope that next year it will be funded at least in part by contributions from former students. Last summer, when the summer camp was reactivated, we had 65 children between the ages of 5 and 12 enrolled. In the month of June, the children had fun: sports, dances, crafts, English lessons, recreational games, workshops, robotics lesson exhibitions, and film days, among others. They also enjoyed a tour of the Criollo Science and Technology Center facilities, a day of games, a Talent Show, splash day and a pizza party. We have the determined help of students, parents, volunteer teachers, sponsors, external collaborators and the staff of the Recreational Summer.
The future of external solidarity efforts with those most in need aims to:
– Increase funding for these programs with external means
– Restore the enrollment numbers of San Alfonso Camp to those prior to the pandemic and the 2017 hurricane.
– Restore the registration numbers of the School to Work program to those prior to the pandemic and the 2017 hurricane.
The Casa María del Perpetuo Socorro project, which aimed to distribute clothing and non-refrigerated food, remained in the drawer of dreams. Since then, however, this dream has almost become a reality.
A building has been built, and equipment has been obtained. However, the impact of the past pandemic and the 2017 hurricane has made it prudent to wait to start its services.
We conclude with photographs that give an idea of the summer life of children at Campo San Alfonso of Notre Dame Catholic School.
written by Jose Grillo (President of the Redemptorist and Oblate College). This College is our work, and its contribution to the mission of the Congregation in Central America and the Caribbean is considerable.
