I must say I got worried when I saw the program and no name was listed there for the "Champion Award". I got a little nervous, because the more I asked, "Who's going to get the Award this year," the more I got evasive answers. I began to figure out something was going on... and much to my surprise it turned out to be me. I am glad that Bishop Sklba was the emcee again this year. I had forgotten that he was a deprived child and didn't have a Catholic education, and that begins to explain a few things to me. Thank you, Richard.

And you probably didn't know this but you are all here at my party tonight, because today February 4th is the Feast of St. Rembert. So thank you for coming to celebrate the Feast of St. Rembert. St. Rembert was the Archbishop of Hamburg in Bremen in northern Germany and was elected bishop on this day in the year 865, by public acclamation. The Archbishop, St. Anscar, had died the day before and Rembert was elected the next day. He was born in Brugge in Belgium. He was bishop for twenty-three years, i.e., until 888. I'm finishing now over twenty-four¯I'm on my twenty-fifth¯which is a long time.

I had to think a bit about schools when I first came here; and I must be very honest tonight and very up front: I confess that when I came to Milwaukee twenty-four-some years ago, 1977, that I was very ambivalent about the schools and the school system. And when I came here, I found that many of the pastors were very ambivalent at that time, 1977.

It was not an easy moment for the schools. There was a lot of contention going on in the parishes between the religious ed programs and the schools, a lot of fighting. Every day I would get a letter from a few religious ed coordinators, and then a few from the schools, everyone wanting my attention, everyone saying they should be on the top of the pile and wanting the money, the funds. So, it was not an easy time. I must confess that many, many of the pastors were not real positive toward the schools, they found that they were in the middle of the same kind of squabble, everybody fighting over limited resources, and they, too, had to make very serious decisions. Some schools had already closed because the pastors just felt that they could never have a Catholic school with tuition. Do you remember that? We had a few schools close because the pastors couldn't conceive of a school that had any kind of tuition.

But probably what had brought all of this to the fore was the fact that the number of sisters was declining rapidly and the number of lay people taking their places had to be increased rapidly; and for the first time we learned how much the sisters had been contributing also financially to that school system and how much more it was going to cost once the sisters were not there. It became for us a really eye-opening experience at that time. And I think it was good also that we realized then how much the sisters had saved us.

I was in the middle of that struggle, that dilemma as to the future of the schools twenty-four years ago. Probably the best thing I can say tonight is that that's all in the past. It is amazing how well we have done in twenty-four years. Those problems¯oh, sure, they still exist¯but they are not at all what they were twenty-four years ago. I don't think today any bishop, any new bishop coming here, will have to worry about support for Catholic schools. And if I have made a bit of a conversion, I can say also that the pastors also have made a great deal of conversion and are very positive about the schools.

What I would like to talk about tonight, though, is a little bit about my conversion towards Catholic schools, how I kind of thought that out. I had had a lot of experience with Catholic colleges; I had been the chancellor of Catholic colleges since I was thirty-six, so I knew a lot about Catholic colleges. And also in Rome, I was chancellor of the school. So that was the easy part. I had had very little experience with Catholic grade schools since my own, being in a Catholic grade school. I had wonderful sisters, it was a wonderful time, and I thoroughly enjoyed Catholic grade school. Then I went away to a Benedictine high school. Now, what could be greater than that, high school with the Benedictines ¯ a boarding school in the '40s, where we had weekends together, nobody went home, everybody was there; and we had so much time on our hands, it was wonderful. So I had to think back on all of that. But what began my conversion to Catholic schools again was reading, I have to be honest, Father Andrew Greeley and the things that he wrote back in the '60s and '70s about Catholic schools. It was a very pragmatic argument, simply saying, "They work!" That's it, "They work!" And he could show that and prove that statistically, that they really work, they create a kind of adherence to the faith and transmitting the faith that nothing else can do better. And so, in reading Andy Greeley, I began to say, "This is something I must look at and accept and take seriously."

I became then very much convinced again of the Catholic position of parental rights and the rights that parents have to be able to teach their children as they want and why that option was important. I also became very convinced that it takes a parish to educate a child and not just parents; and that's the great advantage that we have with our school system, that we have that full parish support that goes way beyond just what parents can do. And as the parental influence often in religion began to fade that it was very important then that the Catholic schools remain. That was kind of then the pragmatic conversion against which I couldn't argue.

Now I am going to stretch a little bit though and also talk more about the theoretical aspects of Catholic education that I began to reflect on and that converted me in every way to the value of our school system and why it must continue.

First of all, I am going to talk about two kinds of holistic education, in two different ways. You have heard all this before; but, as a good teacher would say, "It's important to repeat it." So that is the only way you learn is by repetition. And I am convinced that the Catholic education is holistic in terms of the nature of the human person, first of all: that that human person is intellect, it is will, it is also creativity – and I don't want to forget that. So often people forget that creativity aspect of the human person; and Catholic education has certainly sponsored [if that's the right word] that part of the human person. It is also a spiritual training. We recognize the transcendent destiny of the human person, so that the education takes that into account; and then, of course, that the human person is social is very important for our education. So we take the wholeness of the human person and state that it has to be educated.

When I look back over my Catholic education, how stimulating it was intellectually. I had a few wonderful professors, especially in high school ¯ Father Austin Staley, a brilliant man, and he would prod me to do more and more, even though I thought I was the best in the class; I still had to do more and more. He was always making me go to the library to look up something else. Later when I became his superior, I realized what a difficult character he was; but at least at that point he was a great, great teacher. I bet every one of you can name people of this sort who stimulated you, who gave you that incentive to move ahead. And I have to also confess about the creative aspect. The fact that I had some musical talent in grade school already ¯ we were very poor, we were on Welfare, but the sisters still gave me piano and organ lessons ¯ and how important it was that that part of my talent, my being, was also very much supported. So the Catholic approach touches the whole person and all aspects of it.

The spiritual is very important and the faith dimension is very important, because I am convinced all of us who are concerned about value-based education also we have to be concerned about what supports those values and where they come from. And that's why faith, and our faith, is so important if we want a value-based education. I am not saying that other groups cannot have value-based education; I am not saying that public schools cannot do that. But so often it's dependent then on the individual professor, if you will, that you might happen to get, while at least in a Catholic school we know that the religious basis, the faith basis, is what is going to make those values real and give them a kind of support that otherwise they might not have. And I am also convinced ¯ and I have said this before, if I look back over all the talks I have given on education in all these years ¯ that values have to be supported by virtues, otherwise they stay in the brain. But if a value is going to be put into practice in life, it has to be supported by virtues. And, therefore, the Catholic education sees also that social dimension, the way in which the human person relates to others. And for all of that and the faith-basis of it, I say, yes, we are a holistic education that we can be proud of.

My second aspect of a holistic education is that the way in which knowledge and faith become integrated is holistic. I read not too long ago in The New York Times review of books a review of the recent literature¯and there is a lot of recent literature¯on the relationship between Science and Religion. It is a very fascinating subject that has been on the docket for decades. But there has been right now a spate of books on the relationship of Science and Religion. And in this review by a professor from India, he said, "This is a typical Western problem. We don't have the problem, because faith for us, religion, is private, and the rest of knowledge is not. Therefore, there is no problem." I thought, boy, how far away we are from that kind of thinking, because for us the important thing is not to live a schizophrenic life as if one part of the brain is going to be spiritual and one part of the brain is not but, rather, to integrate all of that into one synthesis that we live by is truly holistic.

Then I went back and read Newman's essay that I hadn't read since I was a seminarian, I confess, and that I had forgotten much about except that it existed, and I went back to read it again, "An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine". And I began to sense that the history of our educational system is always one in which we see growth, not just in facts and knowledge, but in integrating new truths with the old faith, and that this continues on and on and on. Newman gives seven criteria for how an idea can grow and remain true to itself and not become corrupt; but it has to grow. And in that context he says a very famous phrase: "To grow is to live." And how important that it. And so when I think back about Catholic education, how holistic it is, it is a way in which whatever truth is out there has to be integrated with all the other things we know and form a unity. That's what it is about. And in this Newman calls it the principle of assimilation.

Think back about how that has happened over the centuries. The Middle Ages was torn apart by the new philosophy that came with Aristotle. And it took somebody like Aquinas to integrate that with the faith and form the great synthesis of the Summa Theologica. The Renaissance had its big problems with humanistic thinking and how that had to be integrated with the transcendent of the Gothic; and we did it. Then came the scientific revolution and with enormous struggles, more than renovating a Cathedral, we had to integrate all of that scientific thinking with the faith; and we did it and we continue to do it over and over again. Oh, it took centuries to take Galileo and say maybe he had some good ideas; but, nevertheless, as we work at it and work at it and we struggle ¯ if it is true, then we are going to have to integrate it into the faith, that's the way it will have to be, that's the way in which we work. So it becomes holistic then not just in terms of the human person but also in terms of the matter, if you will, of truth itself.

I was thinking about what the great things to be integrated today are, and I think now we are trying to integrate all the findings of psychology, sexuality, sociology, and historical truths. The big fights over the culpability of Pius XII and of us Catholics in creating an atmosphere in which the Holocaust could take place, this is historical truth that we have to come to terms with. We just can't put all that aside rapidly. And so, all of that is the way in which today we are trying to continue in the Catholic tradition in a holistic fashion.

For all of these reasons I became proud of the Catholic tradition and said to myself, it starts in grade school¯the all-school Mass, it starts with Sunday's Mass, it starts with the very beginning where we are constantly thinking in this way ¯ whether we know it or not, we Catholics are holistic thinkers. That's a part of our tradition, where if something is true we are going to find a way of working this out and live with it through the ages. So I became, call it, philosophically convinced that the Catholic tradition is something very much worth keeping and something that we have to be thankful and grateful for.

While I was trying to do all of that intellectually, I had a letter from John Stollenwerk. That brought me back to earth! And John very pragmatically, ala Andrew Greeley, reminded me of the importance of Catholic schools. I want to say a public thanks to him, to PAVE, to Dan McKinley, Don Schuenke, and all of those at PAVE who were willing not just to talk about the need for Catholic schools but to do something about it. Thanks, John, thank you. While I was very capable of all these high theoretical thinking things, you know, they helped me in terms of a very pragmatic way of keeping our schools alive and especially the most vulnerable schools, and for that I am very, very grateful.

The Archdiocese of Milwaukee Supporting Fund, they came along just at the right time also; and I see Erica John here and I want to publicly thank her because she was a part of PAVE and she also was one of those who helped convince me of the importance of maintaining our Catholic schools tradition and maintaining it in a solid way. In the nine or ten years that that Fund now has been in existence, the Fund has given over $15 million dollars to grade schools and high schools in the diocese, over $20 million dollars to education; and when you think about that, that's about $2 million a year ¯ that's a lot of money! And for that I am very, very grateful, and Erica thank you, thank you, thank you.

And I am very thankful to the leadership on the parish level because that leadership on the parish level, beginning with the priests, pastors, and then with so many lay people, when you think about the amount of money we raise each year for our Catholic school system it is incredible. It must be about, I judge, about $140 million. When you think about it, it is an enormous sum of money that the parishes have to come up with each year in order to keep that system going. Just thanks, it means you all must be convinced as much as I am of that importance, otherwise we couldn't be doing it.

A word of thanks also to those who supported Choice. Because we knew we had about forty schools in the heart of our city here that were vulnerable, and that we had to do something, and became very involved in the idea of keeping parental choice for families in that area. And so a word of thanks to Governor Thompson, Mayor Norquist, Howard Fuller, the Mitchells, these are the people who encouraged us and helped us to make sure that choice in education became a reality. And I know that that battle will never be ended and I know that we have a lot of responsibility and accountability because of the choice in education, but I do want to be thankful for being able in our country to keep that way of serving clear.

And a special word of thanks at the end to Maureen Gallagher and her staff. You know, the bishop gets the Awards, other people do the work. I mean it has always been that way. I'm kind of the front man, I say the nice things, I am supposed to encourage people and get them animated and all that stuff, but I don't do the work. I just sit back and take the praise and the plaques. It's simple. And so I have to say a word of gratitude to Maureen in particular and to all her staff for what they have done during these twenty-some years. How long have you been with us, Maureen? It will be twenty years; that's a long time, and the results are clear and evident.

I have to say a word about the future. I am sure that any bishop coming to Milwaukee will be very pleased with the school system he finds here, with the involvement that he will find here, and with the success that we have had so far. I am sure that the challenge for the future for him, for you, for all of us will be excellence. Schools have to be good, that's all there is to it. Let us put it this way, the poorer the neighborhood, the better the school should be, because the needs are greater. So we have to do that, we just simply have to continue to have the very best of schools. And this is going to mean that we are going to have to do more for our teachers. I am convinced that they are the ones who are going to require much more attention into the future. And so anybody coming here will say, yes, you have done well, but these are the areas that we simply must beef up [if that is the right word] into that future to make sure that the excellency of the schools stands there. You can't talk about holistic and you can't talk about holistic in terms of the subject matter, the relationship between faith and the other truths, without at the same time talking about excellence. You need people who are good in science, in history, in everything, if you want to have good schools. So we must not fail in that respect.

In 1990 I had the opportunity of visiting Russia twice. The first time was a dialogue with the Russian Orthodox bishops in Moscow, and the second time I spent three weeks in Siberia¯not getting ready for anything, but just looking at Siberia. Everywhere I went I was being taken to schools. The one thing that the Soviet Communist regime wanted to show off were the schools. They put big money into the schools because they realized that the way to influence the future and the next generation is through the schools. They didn't have to be taught that; they saw that. So even in 1990, coming to their end and didn't have money for anything else, money was going into those school systems because that was for the future.

When I was in Italy between 1967 and 1977, I used to watch the Communist party. They always got their very best, most attractive young women and men as teachers, especially in the high schools. That's where you influence people and their minds; it was quite clear. We Catholics are really rather naive about things like that, but they were bound to get their very vest there so that the Communist doctrine would have an appealing human face. That's the way in which it was done. And in some respects it was like the gospel says: the children of this world often are wiser than the children of light. And so we can learn from those systems that the future depends on the kind of education that we give our children.

Could I say that I think the Catholic kind of education, the full human person and at the same time the fullness of truth and knowledge, is very much needed at this point of history. In that same essay by Newman I was struck in rereading it now because I saw tings I didn't see when I was a seminarian. That can happen to you, because then you thought you knew everything; now you know you know nothing. But Newman has a passage in their where he talks about the Catholic tradition of integrating, assimilating all truth with faith and making that a single unit in one's person. He talks about how different then we are from the Evangelical and Fundamentalist traditions and how true that is, and how different we are¯and he says this very delicately¯from the Islamic tradition, where he says such integration, insofar as he knows, is not taking place. It's interesting, isn't it, how when I saw that years ago I paid no attention to it. When I saw it now, I said to myself, yes, maybe there is something that we have to think about here; maybe we have a contribution at this point of history that goes beyond our Catholic tradition and is something that all religious traditions have to think about.

And going back to my Indian doctor who reviewed those books, I recall once in India an old Hindu guru saying to me: "The future lies with you people, not with us, because we have no way of integrating progress into our thinking." An interesting comment, wasn't it? Again, I recorded it back here, but I didn't do much with it. We have a lot to think about and a lot to talk about at this moment of history. And I don't think we Catholics should be too meek, too humble, too reticent to say that we have a contribution to make now in terms of the relationship between all truth and religion that the whole world needs. Just as we struggle with it, everybody has to struggle with it to make sure that we have a future where we can agree on some very important aspects of the human person, of society, and what the future should look like.

Boy, with that in mind, how can you not come back next year! I don't expect you all to go home and say, now, this is what the bishop talked about, because it is pretty complicated. But a good teacher at the end gives a few summaries. I talked about holistic in two different senses, holistic in terms of the whole human person¯transcendent, spiritual, etc., and I talked about holistic in terms of all knowledge, all aspects of truth, so that all of these come together with our faith to form just one way of perceiving, of looking at, of living the life that God has given us.

Blessings on all of you. Thank you very much.