This week, I have spent much of my office time reading and responding to applications for the “Faith Community Scholarship” from our school families. Previously, Catholic families who attended Assumption Catholic School would receive an “in-parish” discount from their tuition, which was generally funded through the subsidies paid by the Whatcom County parishes. Next year, however, that discount is no longer automatic, nor does it have a set amount. Instead, with a renewed commitment to making sure that Catholic families are able to attend Catholic school, our approach going forward is to ask our families what they need to make Catholic school affordable for them, and then to have them apply to their parish for a scholarship for that amount. Some families need less than what was previously given to them and some families need more. With this system, the local pastors have the flexibility to be responsive to the needs of their families directly.
The road to this change has been two years in the making and involves a lot of other paradigm shifts. I have packaged together all of my communications about this change here, if you would like all of the nitty-gritty details.
I wanted to bring this to your attention because these scholarships are funded by you. Yes, Assumption parishioners have helped fund Assumption School since its inception, and I think most of our parishioners know this is part of their Sunday giving. But, as supremely important as funding Catholic education is, funding an institution still feels like an abstract concept. Now, however, it is far more obvious that what you, our parishioners, are funding is individual students and families. Our families. When you go to Mass each weekend and see an Assumption School student sitting in front of you in the pews, you can assume that part of your weekly contribution has gone towards helping that student attend Catholic school.
Christianity is deeply relational, because our God himself is deeply relational. As I have been immersed in scholarships this week, that relationality has weighed heavily upon me. I want our students to know that it is individual parishioners in the pews who are helping them access a Catholic education, and I want our parishioners to know that they are the reason some of these students are even able to attend our school to begin with. A Christian community relies on each other, and these scholarships are a beautiful, concrete expression of that.
Fr. Moore 