If you have been to our Secondary Schools recently you will agree with me that a lot is happening in our Secondary Schools today. There is a high rate of deception and manipulation going on. As a place where people of diverse family, social, cultural and spiritual, religious backgrounds conglomerate, there is the danger of young people who are not properly guided to be negatively influenced by the prevailing ideologies in the school environment.
Consequently many our young Catholics in our dilapidated Secondary Schools are victims of circumstances. They are confronted in all direction with the crisis of personal identity, cultural identity, and religious identity. Many are lost in the crowd, they have no personal conviction of the Catholic faith they profess.
Today many of our young Catholic in our secular Secondary Schools are molested and intimidated by some of their non catholic/Pentecostal teachers and colleagues. This case is even worse in those private Secondary Schools that are owned by non Catholics. In most cases, our Catholic students who attend these schools face serious attacks as regards their Catholic faith. Cases have been reported where some teachers in these schools even go as far as forcing Catholic students to throwaway their Rosaries, Scapulars and crucifix, while some teachers go to the extent of destroying these Sacramental themselves and some even threatened to fail the students if they refuse to comply.
Faced with this ugly situation most of our Catholic students are compelled to imbibe the spirituality of their teachers or proprietors. Hence, there is the looming danger of losing them to the Pentecostals. Since they now becoming more Pentecostal than Catholics.
The fact in all of these is that the freedoms of religion among many Catholic students are trampled upon by many non Catholic proprietors and teachers.
The real question therefore is: what do we do to promote and sustain the faith of our Catholic students in private or public Secondary Schools? How can the Church intervene? How can we help our Catholic students to rediscover the joy of being a Catholic; become enthusiastic about the faith and convincingly and boldly profess their faith in the society? This is the task before us, this the real challenge facing the Local Church in our Diocese in this Year of Faith.
It is against this background that I wish to make the following recommendation as the way forward towards sustaining the faith of young Catholic students in our Secondary Schools.
RECOMMENDATIONS
- Catholic teachers working in government Secondary Schools should help to organize and co-ordinate the Catholic students within the Schools; sometimes Catholic teachers do not know those who are Catholics among the students in their Schools. There should be good relationship between Catholic teachers and students.
- Catholic teachers should also help the Catholic students to be part of the Young Catholic Students Association in their Schools.
- Catholic teachers could also help to organize lectures or talks to the Catholic students in their School.
- Catholics who are owners of Private Schools should see their School not only as a means of making profit but also as a means of winning souls to Christ: Therefore, they should use their Schools for the purpose of evangelization; to achieve this end, they must use the establishment of the School to promote Catholic values; organize lectures and talks for their students, they can also relate with the priests within their jurisdiction to come and celebrate the Mass or the Liturgy of the Word with the students from time to time.
- The service of Catholic lay evangelizers who have been trained in the art of evangelization could also be employed: they could be charged with responsibility of organizing talks and seminars but in Government Secondary Schools and Private Schools owned by Catholics under the supervision of the Church.
- Tracts and periodicals could be produced and distributed to all students both Catholics and non Catholics as a means of evangelization.
- The fundamental human rights and the freedom of religion should be re-emphasized in the Schools.
CONCLUSION:
It is not just enough to plant the faith, it is of greater importance to sustain and nature the faith: This is the task we have to carry out for the good of our Catholic ‘students and the good of the Church. I strongly believe that if we apply these and many other suggestions in the evangelizing mission of the church, we shall make incredible progress in this regard.