Mass with the
Catholic Teachers of the Diocese of Paisley
Memorial of St. Francis of Assisi
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I think the first thing I want to say to
you this evening is, “Thank you for being a Catholic teacher
and thank you for teaching in a Catholic school.” Your
dedication and commitment to the children and young people
for whom you have responsibility is deeply appreciated by
parents and families, by priests and parishes, by the bishop
and by the diocese. So thank you for everything you are and
you do as a Catholic teacher and as teacher in a Catholic
school. And thank you for being present at this Mass this
evening.
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I want also to encourage you in your
vocation as a Catholic teacher. As a priest, I have always
considered teachers to be among my closest co-workers in the
pastoral care of the community. In the work of the Catholic
teacher, the words of praise of Jesus for his heavenly
Father come true: “I bless you, Father, Lord of heaven and
earth for hiding these things from the learned and the
clever and revealing them to mere children.” “These things”
are, of course, the mysteries of the kingdom, the mysteries
of God which are the heart of our faith. And you, along with
parents and priests and others, are a very important link in
the chain of the transmission of faith to the children, to
the young, to the generation of the future. I would like
you, therefore, not to be afraid or reserved about thinking
of your profession also as a vocation, as a calling from
God, as the working out of your baptismal vocation, as your
way to holiness, and as your service of God and his church.
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As I said recently at a high school
awards ceremony, it is undeniable that
most of what you learn at a
Catholic school you can learn at any school. But the
assumptions of learning at a Catholic school are different
and these assumptions inform and change everything. We
consciously stand our education on the great truth that
there is a God, that we are His creatures, and that the
ultimate point of life is to love and serve Him and be happy
with Him forever after death. As I say, these underlying
assumptions change and inform everything: the school, the
ethos of the school community, the conclusions which may be
drawn from learning, the admissions’ policy, the employment
policies, the mission statement of the school and even the
nature of the building.
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I say this, yes, to point to our sense
of the uniqueness of Catholic education, but I say it above
all this evening to support you in your faith. You will have
gathered that I have a great regard for our teachers. As I
said to graduates, I hope you will not just be teachers with
a job in a Catholic school, but Catholic teachers who teach
in a Catholic school. So I encourage you to grow in faith,
to pray continuously, and to live a life worthy of your
vocation as a Catholic teacher. Jesus says to you: “Come to
me all you who labour and are over-burdened, and I will give
you rest.” You need to go to Him for your own good, but you
need to go to Him too for the good of the children and young
people that you teach.
St. Mirin’s Cathedral
4th October 2007
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