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Dear Parents,

First and foremost, I want to express my deepest gratitude to each of you who supported this past weekend’s Country Fair! From our Chairs, Tim and Marguerite Stewart, and Co-Chairs, Gregg and Jodie Schneider, to the many and hard-working Committee Chairs to our Advancement Office staff, especially Jan McCosker, to every single parent who volunteered at a booth or helped to set up or stayed to clean up, I, want to earnestly, enthusiastically and wholeheartedly THANK YOU!

As I stated last week, the Academy absolutely needs the funds raised from Country Fair in order to meet our budgeted operating expenses. It is also true that all of us have come to value and appreciate the quality of communal connections which are created through our collaborative efforts working toward this common financial goal. From my humble perspective, the weekend was a HUGE success all around! Thank you, thank you, thank you for helping to make it so!

Now, a word about our special Feast Day which we will be celebrating tomorrow – the Feast of Mater Admirabilis. As most of you know, this image of Mary was painted in 1844 by a young novice in the Society of the Sacred Heart, Pauline Perdrau, who took it upon herself to produce a fresco of the Virgin Mary on a wall in the Trinita dei Monti, a Sacred Heart school in Rome. Sister Perdrau chose to paint Mary as a young woman, sitting in the temple, clothed in a rose-colored dress. Representations of Mater Admirabilis (Latin for Mother Most Admirable) can be found in Sacred Heart schools throughout the world.

But, how does this relate to our students (or to us) today? I have come to believe that Mater may provide one of the most important lessons we can teach our children. How so?

Given the circumstances in which we live, we can allow ourselves to easily be distracted with the exterior noise, chatter and potential exterior influences. Examples might include what people think, what people say, what is written or talked about in the media, and in our own social networks (virtual or personal). If we are not moving through our world with a grounded center, we can be affected by these exterior “factors” in ways that overly determine our interior attitudes, thought patterns, dispositions or emotional states.

This image of Jesus’ Mother calls us to something totally other. Mater, through her contemplative example, calls us to the depth of our own being. She calls us to our own interior space, where, when we are attentive (as she is), where, when we are silent (as she is), where, when we are focused inwardly (as she is), we discover the place in our deepest self where Christ resides WITH us, IN us and AS us. From this place, our attitudes, our thought patterns, our dispositions and our emotional states are NOT affected BY the world, as much as AFFECT the world. Living from this place within, we become Christ in the world without.

This is my deepest hope for our students: that they learn how to live life from the inside-out and affect their world AS the Face of Christ!

Happy Feast,

Maureen Glavin, rscj

Dear Academy Families,

The “buzz” around the school this week is palpably Country Fair!  From the presence of pumpkins, to Marketplace volunteers, to raffle sale conversations, to Fun Run trophy chatter, this place is being painted with a palette of excitement as we anticipate a fun-filled weekend.

It is important for me to take a moment to remind everyone that proceeds from this weekend are an essential aspect of our yearly budget. Every donation, every dollar spent and every volunteer hour given is a contribution to the Academy program. In fact, Country Fair typically brings in around $50,000 net income to the annual operating budget. So, as you have an enjoyable day with your children and friends, know that you are also making a significant contribution to the school’s ability to deliver a quality program.

An equally important aspect of Country Fair is the opportunity it provides us to build community with each other. Hopefully you will have a chance to spend time with each other, get to know each other a little more, perhaps meet a new family and enjoy one another’s company. Not only do these connections occur over a meal or a game of washers, but, they occur in the shared task of “making the day happen.” Setting up for the fair, running a booth together, and assisting in the cleanup can be as community building as a conversation over coffee.   

Come one, come all! Bring your friends and family. Enjoy the day. Enjoy the food. Enjoy the fun. And THANK YOU, from the bottom of my heart, for all you have done, are doing and will do, to make it happen.

See you at the Fair!

Maureen Glavin, rscj