Category Archives: church history

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I just had to share this.  Today.

 
From Melville House
May 10, 2012

St. Patrick of Armagh, deliver me from writing

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“The history of bookmaking hasn’t been without its challenges, but
never was its craft as painstaking as during the era of illuminated
manuscripts,” says Maria Popova. Well, try laying out an ebook that has art in it. But Popova makes a good case in a commentary for Brainpickings.org, citing a recent Lapham’s Quarterly article
(not available online) that lists complaints written by monks found
scribbled in the margins of those medieval illuminated manuscripts.
Some examples:

This parchment is hairy.
Thank God, it will soon be light.
New parchment, bad ink; I will say nothing more.
Now I’ve written the whole thing: for Christ’s sake give me a drink.
St. Patrick of Armagh, deliver me from writing.

Think of that, modern day publishers, the next time you find yourself
working late at night on one of those tedious requirements of
modern-day publishing, like, say, blogging. At least your keyboard isn’t
… hairy ….

Dennis Johnson is the founder of MobyLives, and the co-founder and co-publisher of Melville House. Follow him on Twitter at @mobylives

Millennials don’t know about Holocaust, according to survey

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April 12th was Holocaust Remembrance Day. Sadly, people are
forgetting about it. See the sobering NY Times article
linked here.
We are so blessed to host a survivor here at
Carondelet Friday, April 20th, during 5th and 6th periods, in the Garaventa. The
number of living Holocaust survivors dwindles as the years go on. As
the article states, “Holocaust remembrance
advocates and educators, who agree that no book, film or traditional exhibition
can compare to the voice of a survivor, dread the day when none are left to
tell their stories.”
Our guest, Hana Berger Moran, is
in her 70s and was born in a concentration camp. She will be here to tell her
and her mother’s story, as chronicled in the recent book, Born
Survivors by Wendy Holden.



Our freshmen learn about the Holocaust in their history
curriculum, and the English department teaches it with the classic graphic
novel Maus by Art Spiegelman. Church History classes also
address the Holocaust. Thank goodness our school continues to educate youth
about the horrific events of the Holocaust. The Catholic faith is immeasurably
linked to the Jewish people. Let us never forget.

Thank you for supporting this important event. I know that
losing instruction time gets tricky. I welcome all of you to attend along with
our freshmen, if you can make it. Please
join us even if you can’t stay the whole time. 
Particulars: Hana will start at 12:30 and continue through the
end of 6th period. Fifth period teachers of frosh: please take attendance
before escorting (or sending) girls to the Garaventa Center. Sixth period
teachers of frosh: The girls won’t be checking in that day. Students have been
given Teacher Notification forms for you to sign.

Gratitude Photo Journals & Faculty/Staff Shout Outs

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Over the last 3 weeks my students and I have been keeping a gratitude journal, but instead of writing things down on paper we post pictures on to a Schoology album and caption them in 140 characters or less.  They post all week and Friday we share.  We look forward to it, as soon as they walk in the door on Friday they remind me that we have to look at the class journal.  We scroll through pictures, some funny and some serious, and share moments and memories that mean a lot to them.

Gratitude Photo(video) Journal from 1st Period Church History 

I think that this exercise helps me to remember the little things that matter; every day I walk into our doors I feel like I’m home.  Every day I walk into my classroom and it’s clean despite the fact that I know I didn’t necessarily leave it that way makes me SO grateful.  Over hearing students talking about teachers and by and large it’s POSITIVE is an awesome thing!

I see my girls more aware of the little things too.  After Corazon my students were writing thank yous to Sister Joann, Sister AB, and their leaders.  One girl said out loud that she wished she could thank our crossing guard because she’s so nice.  Everyone instantly agreed, and that was that.  They made a poster.

 The road in the poster is full of #hashtags describing all the ways Alisha makes their day better and keeps them safe.

The girls brought it to Alisha right before lunch.  It was such a fun and meaningful moment.  We really do have an awesome staff.  Afterwards girls shared other people they wanted to thank and we decided that as a class that we would create a project during Lent to recognize people in the school who have a huge impact on them who are not their teachers.

It got me thinking… could we make a gratitude photo journal as a staff and faculty?  I can’t believe how much I got to learn about my girls from getting to see glimpses into their lives at home, with their friends, and on their teams.

Could we start faculty meetings from now on by taking 5 minutes for anyone to recognize a colleague for something awesome that they see them doing around campus?

What do you think? Do you have any other ideas or input about creating small opportunities to share gratitude? Tell me in the comments.