“Freindly Fire Zone”

Part Two

If the Church had fought for true school choice, many schools would be thriving

What does it tell you when private Notre Dame Academy in Villanova has 101 students in its freshman class --- at $20,000 per year --- and Archbishop Prendergast in Drexel Hill, an Archdiocesan high school, has…82?  Yes --- eighty two.

That the economy is booming because folks can shell out 20K a pop? That the gap between rich and poor is widening, with more people in the “have” category?  Not quite.

It tells us, in no uncertain terms, two things:

1) Over the last several decades, too many leaders in the Catholic Church have strayed from their Godly mission, trying to be all things to all people, destroying the Catholic identity, and, worst of all, covering-up the child sex scandal and protecting pedophile priests (See January 11 column).  The result has been, and continues to be, apathy for most, anger for many, and an exodus from the Church for thousands of others.  The Church has reaped what it has sown, and nowhere is that more evident that the 30 percent decrease in Catholic school enrollment in Archdiocesan schools.

2) The Catholic Church, for all its money, muscle and might, has been a political paper tiger in fighting for its beliefs, most notably school choice. For the last 15 years, it either didn’t do its job to ensure passage of legislation that would provide a voucher to parents (their own tax money) to send their children to the school of their choice, or it backed meaningless and ineffective bills.  Either way, if the Church had done its job effectively without cowering at the sight of its own shadow, only a handful of the 49 schools that closed recently and the scores --- that everyone seems to be forgetting --- that have been shuttered over the last decade, would be out of business.  In fact, most would be thriving.

The Prendie situation tells it all.  While officially having “open enrollment” where physical or Church boundaries are not criteria for admission, Prendie still traditionally draws from Catholic “feeder schools,” as does its brother school, Monsignor Bonner (119 in its freshman class).  Do the math. If we conservatively estimate that there are 22 elementary schools serving those high schools, that’s fewer than 4 girls per school going to Prendie, and just 6 attending Bonner.  No wonder they closed!

(Though a strong case can be made to consolidate the two schools, many believe the Archdiocese will not do so because a nearby hospital may be eyeing the land. With potentially millions more in abuse settlements, the Church may need the proceeds of that sale to pay those large amounts --- just as the Boston Archdiocese sold 99 acres of prime real estate to Boston College to pay settlements.  Closing schools to pay sex scandal settlements just infuriates Catholics that much more, leading to a vicious circle of yanking students from Catholic schools altogether).

And why are the elementary schools not sending more students?  Two reasons.  Many parents are choosing public schools because they don’t feel the value of Catholic high school is justified by a $6,000 price tag.  And of course, there aren’t many students left in Catholic elementary schools in the first place.  Take Annunciation BVM in Irish Catholic Havertown. It is slated to close, allegedly because there aren’t enough students in attendance (though they hit the attendance number the Diocese mandated and are one of a handful of schools with a parish surplus). But a drive through the town will instinctively tell you what any demographic statistician already knows: the Catholic population is more than healthy enough to see Annunciation at 80 percent capacity --- or even more.

The proof? In 1911, there were 68,000 students in Archdiocesan schools, out of 525,000 Catholics (in a diocese, by the way, that was considerably larger in size than the one today).  A century later, we are back at the same level of 68,000 (down from a peak of 250,000 in the 1960’s), yet the smaller-sized Archdiocese now has almost 1.5 million Catholics. Those numbers clearly show that, for most areas (inner city Philadelphia being an exception), the Catholic population is absolutely large enough to support most of the schools that closed.

Taking out of the equation those parents who are angry or disenfranchised with the Church (and its schools), there still remains a substantial number of families that would love nothing better than to enroll their children, but simply cannot afford to do so.

Unfortunately, those people get walloped with a triple wammy. They slog through life paying some of the highest tax rates in the entire world, funding wholly ineffective governments at all levels while getting relatively little value in return. They live in one of the few countries in the Western world that does not assist parents with nonpublic school education.  And they are scared to death about receiving a pink slip in an economy that is tanking further by the day, with many banking what they earn rather than paying for the desired education for their children.

Enter school choice in Pennsylvania. Or lack thereof.

In 1995, a statewide, comprehensive school choice bill failed by a single vote. And while the Church played an active role in that fight, it refused to do the things necessary that would have pushed the legislation across the finish line. Priests should have been preaching from the pulpit, educating parishioners on the merits of school choice and rallying the troops to contact their legislators (which can clearly be done without jeopardizing their nonprofit status). But overall, they didn’t.

They could have placed pro-school choice cards addressed to representatives and senators in each pew, to be filled out during Mass and collected before exiting church. But they didn’t.

And they could have tied all of it together by playing hardball with wishy-washy politicians, informing them in no uncertain terms that school choice would be the one and only issue that many Catholics would be voting on --- and Catholics vote --- in the next election.  But they didn’t.

Instead, too many left the battle to the “insiders,” and guess what? Choice failed, and schools closed.  A lot of them, most of which would be open today had school choice passed.
 
Fast forward to 2011. What did the Church do?  Support the weakest, most meaningless education reform bill that would have neither helped educate nor reform anything (Senate Bill 1).  It was so restrictive that it would not have affected one middle class family, but the final version (which bombed) seemed to cater only to those Capricorns in the inner city who promised to wear plaid pants on Tuesdays.

The Catholic Conference’s rationale for supporting such a bad bill? Incrementalism was the only way to go, and, after all, that was the only bill out there. Talk about a losing mentality. Maybe if the Catholic leaders in their ivory towers had the foresight to see what was coming down the pike with school closings, they would have made a broad-based bill a reality and went full-bore to accomplish passage. And since the 1995 bill was run with a somewhat hostile legislature and still almost passed, it should have been a no-brainer to aggressively push for a bill this time that would also help the middle class, since the Governor and legislature were infinitely more amenable to such a bill.

But they didn’t.

And they didn’t even push for an expansion of the educational improvement tax credit (EITC) after school choice failed, which, while not a panacea, would certainly help.

Senate Bill 1, even had it passed, would not have saved one Catholic school. But that was simply an alien concept to the Church’s political braintrust, and the results speak for themselves.

As a result, all people suffer the financial consequences. Of the over 24,000 students displaced, a significant number will now attend public school.  And since it costs over $15,000 per student, per year to educate a public school student, property taxes are about to go through the roof, which could not come at a worse time.  Not only will more textbooks and buses have to be purchased, but more teachers, more modular classrooms, and, quite soon, more capital projects to accommodate the influx of Catholic school students.

Some claim that school choice is a bailout of the Catholic schools.  Wrong. Since the money is directed to the parent, not the school, it clearly isn’t.  But it will be interesting to see the reaction from critics of school choice (and Catholicism in general) when they can no longer afford to pay their property taxes. As the saying goes, what goes around comes around.

Where do we go from here?

There is a passage from a book written in the 1987 book, God’s Children, that best sums up why Catholic education must be saved:

“The Catholic Church must forget its inferiority complex. No other religion is reluctant to ask for what it wants. If we don’t ask, if we don’t stand up and fight for what we believe in, we can’t expect to win. Life is a street fight. We can roll up our sleeves and jump in, not certain whether we’ll win or lose, or walk away, allowing a huge part of our heritage to disappear….

If we fail, what do we tell the ghosts? The nuns and priests who for two centuries devoted their lives to the cause? The men and women, like our parents, who broke their backs to support their families yet somehow found a way to support our schools? Do we tell them that it’s over, that their legacy has disappeared forever? That we couldn’t hold on to what they gave us?”

And most haunting:

“I don’t want to tell my children and grandchildren that I was around when time ran out on Catholic education.”

Is it that time?  Put it this way.  Anyone who believes that the closings are done is simply deluding himself, for shutting down schools is a band-aid solution to a gaping wound that will continue to hemorrage.
 
That is, unless the Archdiocese of Philadelphia somehow finds a leader with the courage of his convictions, someone willing to “roll up his sleeves” and fight for what is right.

Archbishop Chaput, your 15 minutes are upon you, and the floor is yours. Godspeed!

Chris Freind is an independent columnist, television/radio commentator, and investigative reporter who operates his own news bureau, www.FreindlyFireZone.com  His self-syndicated model has earned him the largest cumulative media voice in Pennsylvania. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

A compilation of random observations

The best thing about being a columnist is that there’s never a shortage of material --- especially the kind that leaves you shaking your head.  The bad part is that there isn’t enough time to cover all those topics thoroughly.

So the following is a brief perspective on various events, many of which the media has missed:

Pennsylvania School Choice Disaster:  For the last year, those fighting for educational reform (comprehensive choice in education) but against Senate Bill 1, the fatally-flawed bill in Harrisburg that would have neither educated nor reformed (and is now dead), were lectured on the merits of “incrementalism” by SB 1 proponents. “You have to get a little at a time,” they scolded.

Well, despite never actually trying to pass a broader bill that would include the middle class, which is why school choice failed, the SB 1 folks pushing the incremental approach were, admittedly, smashingly successful.  They set the entire Movement back incrementally.  Comprehensive school choice passed the senate in 1991, and garnered 89 votes in the House (of the needed 102). In 1995, an even broader bill had 101 votes --- just one shy.  Yet in 2011, with a Governor who made vouchers a number one priority, major Republican majorities in both chambers, and literally millions at their lobbying disposal, the SB 1 forces couldn’t even get 90 votes, as evidenced by the vote this week.

So let’s see. In 20 years, we went from 89 to 101 to 90.   Not exactly progress, but definitely incrementalism. 

Political Motivation: The “politically motivated” charge is an overused --- and   meaningless --- line uttered by those who refuse to confront the truth.  Consider two recent examples, with the typical lack of follow-up by the media to call the complainers on the carpet:

Herman Cain is certainly an affable chap, but had no business running for President for two reasons.  First, he was simply clueless on the issues, as his entertaining responses illustrated.  Second, if you’re going to be under the most intense spotlight in the world, you need to be up front with your skeletons so that they are revealed on your terms. But Cain didn’t do that, and he got burned.

How could he possibly think that three sexual harassment suits wouldn’t come to light? In his announcement speech, he could have denied wrongdoing, blamed bloodthirsty trial lawyers and wimpy settle-happy insurance companies, and moved on.  Instead, he just kept blaming Rick Perry and later the Democrats for leaking it, self-righteously stating that the story was “politically motivated.”

Hey Herman, here’s a newsflash.  You were running for President of the United States! Of course it’s politically motivated!  So what? It’s not whether something is politically motivated but whether the allegations were true --- which the national media never seemed to ask. Politicians leak things about their opponents all the time, motivated by their desire to win.   If he had just been honest from the beginning, he might well still be in the race.

And locally, we have all the Democratic leaders fuming about the new congressional districts, redrawn every ten years by the party in power in Harrisburg, which happens to be the GOP.  Therefore --- you guessed it --- we have the Dems leveling the charge that the gerrymandered districts were drawn that way for political purposes (or, as one classicly described the new 7th District, “Meehan-mandered”).

Well, let’s see.  They are congressional seats, filled by… politicians.  They are designed by… politicians.  They will remain unchanged for the next decade, so the drawing was done for … political purposes.  Where’s the surprise?  That’s the way it’s always worked.  Interestingly, the Dems’ statements could be swapped word for word with Republicans when they were out of power.

Wouldn’t it have been refreshing to hear a Democratic official just be honest and say, “Yes, the districts suck for us. Kudos to the GOP.  They got slaughtered in 2006 and 2008, but won when it counted (2010), and now we have to live with the results. It’s our Party’s fault, so we’ll be sure to gear up in 2020 to gerrymander them to our liking.”

But that type of honesty is just a pipe dream in politics.

Catholic Church changes: Church leaders decided that it would be a nice idea to substantially change the liturgy using new translations.  Brilliant move.  It took centuries for most Catholics to even begin mumbling the prayers at Sunday Mass (though singing is still nonexistent), and now they change the whole works?  You can hear the crickets…

Fair or not, it has also left many wondering why the Church spent so much time and energy on such an endeavor while still not cleaning up its own house regarding the (continuing) sex scandals. And not coincidentally, more Catholic school closings will be announced next month.  Sorry, that’s not because of the economy, demographics and population shifts, but lack of leadership, very little transparency and an image of arrogance that will be very hard to break. Amen.

Safe To Fly? Think Again: A hugely important story that got very little attention is the new Transportation Security Administration (TSA) rules that don’t require children under 12 to take their shoes off for x-ray inspection. Additionally, children will receive significantly fewer pat-downs (which, despite the inevitable claims by one or two loud-mouthed whining parents who just want to get on TV, are not intrusive. And the parents are never separated from their children during pat-downs).

Well, at least it’s reassuring that terrorists don’t know about this new policy.  Oh wait…they do.

Not only do we implement such an insane, politically correct procedure, but gleefully announce it to the world.  And since there are numerous examples of terrorists strapping bombs to their children’s bodies in the name of God knows what, does anyone really think they won’t gleefully accept this gift, change their strategy, and place explosives in Junior’s shoe?

And when the next disaster occurs, we’ll all stand around wondering how on Earth this could have happened.  For that answer, just look to the TSA signs announcing the policy.

Of course, before that tragedy occurs, we could end the security theatre and start profiling, make everyone take off their shoes, and have no exceptions for pat-downs.  As always, those who don’t like it can take the bus to Europe.

And finally, for all the Eagles fans who have been praying for Andy Reid’s firing at the end of the season, keep dreaming. The Birds will play just well enough to keep the best three-quarter coach in football right where he is.  After all, this is Philadelphia, and we revel in the misery heaped upon us, year after year, by boneheaded decisions made by our teams.

And you can take that $10,000 bet right to the bank.

Chris Freind is an independent columnist, television/radio commentator, and investigative reporter who operates his own news bureau, www.FreindlyFireZone.com  His self-syndicated model has earned him the largest cumulative media voice in Pennsylvania. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it