Teaching the word of God

By Ines Novacic

Israel is a middle school student from Brooklyn, and he’s tired this morning. Throughout Sunday mass at his local parish, the Shrine Church of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel in Williamsburg, he sits slumped over. The hood of his red jumper covers his face for the duration of the 10am service.

As echoes of “Alleluia” from the closing hymn infuse the nave, many rise and prepare to go home. But for Israel, who preferred not to give his last name, worship is not over.

Most teenagers relax on Sundays, Israel has religious education. He not only goes to mass, but a “Faith Formation” class immediately afterwards.

Israel wasn’t any more animated when it came to faith class. His teacher, Lou Aponte, moved her chair in front of the blackboard. “Now,” she said, “we talked about the Pentecost last week. Who can tell me about it?”

Four hands shot into the air.

“Israel, what about you?”

His hands hadn’t moved from under his chin, but finally he did respond.

“Um, wasn’t it, after that, when the Holy Spirit came to St. Peter, and they were all scared, St. Peter came onto the balcony and everyone understood him?”

“Yes, the Holy Spirit was their translator.” Aponte said. “Peter and the disciples and Mary were visited by the Holy Spirit, and he told them to preach about Christ’s resurrection. The disciples felt abandoned when Jesus rose and ascended to Heaven. They felt lonely, and they were persecuted. But the Holy Spirit came and became their fire. He gave them their incentive. He was their backbone, and he gave them everything to go down and preach.” Aponte looked at each of her students.

“Ramon, please read page 23 from your book,” she said.

A small, dark-haired adolescent began reading a chapter titled “Gifts of the Holy Spirit”. He concluded the first paragraph: “like any gift, the ones from the Holy Spirit have to be opened.”

“And how do we get these gifts?” Aponte addressed the class. “Do they get mailed to you?”

The kids looked at each other and giggled.

“No!”

“On Confirmation, are you gonna get a big package?”

“No!”

“Of course not! It means open your mind, open your hearts. It’s just like in school, when you have a project you have to work with. You’re the Holy Spirit’s project, you have to work with him.”

Class ended shortly after noon, after further discussions about the teachings of the Holy Spirit, and instruction on how to follow Christ. Aponte let the kids joke around, and pointed out that maximizing on their talents counted as “following Christ”. She’s been teaching for 20 years at the Mt. Carmel parish.

“I have 14 teachers in total,” said Walsh, in the kitchen of the Rectory, after she closed and locked the six rooms that had been in use for religious education. “Every single one is a volunteer.”

The kettle boiled. Walsh explains how each person, whether teacher or parent, “or whoever,” who comes into contact with kids in the “Faith Formation” program, has to complete a “Virtus” training. Because of the recent sex abuse scandals that ravaged the reputation of the Catholic Church, each Diocese now mandates a once-off special “working with children” workshop.

Walsh says that she wakes up a little bit happier on the days she has to come to Mt. Carmel. Her work with kids from the parish is “her life.”

“Normally, there’s a minimum of six classes for sacrament. We do 12. We think it’s that important,” said Walsh, sipping Early Grey tea.

“And we make the kids come to mass, of course! It’s backing up what we’re doing, right?”

This entry was posted on Monday, March 5th, 2012 at 8:13 pm. It is filed under Ines Novacic, News, View From NYC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.