March 13, 2011

Thanks to those parents and friends who helped make the week a success
● Mrs. Gin Howard, Mrs. Chelsey Lenahan and Mrs. Joan Terlisner for providing a luncheon for our students and faculty
● Mrs. Aguilar and her mother for bringing stacks to the away baseball game

As reflected in our newly posted photos, February was a busy month at St. Michael’s Prep School. Our Norbertine Fathers appeared at Seagerstrom Hall in the Orange County Performing Arts Center, we celebrated the sacrament of confirmation, we heard Sister Christen speak to our parents on the importance of prayer for our sons, our sophomores and juniors spent a day learning about non-invasive surgery at the UCI Medical Center, our boys enjoyed a day at the beach, we ended the soccer season with an awards ceremony and opened the baseball season. We hope you enjoy sharing these experiences with us through our photos.

Photo Gallery

General announcements to Parents
School will be dismissed at 12:40 Wednesday, March 16th for the St. Patrick and St. Joseph Day weekend. Students report back to school as usual on Sunday evening.

Third quarter oral exams take place this week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

The deadline for 2011/2012 non-refundable tuition deposits is March 21st.

The deadline for the Senior Graduation Fee is April 1st.

Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC)–Western Catholic Education Association (WCEA)

Please note that the Visiting Committee will meet with all the parents of St. Michael’s Prep on Sunday Evening, March 20, at 7:00 PM, in the modular classroom. This meeting will take no more than 1 hour. It is very important that all parents come to the meeting.

This week’s photos:
The visit of the relic of St. Mary Magdalene; Latin III class working on their Latin compositions

Parent/Student Handbook: Chapter 3, Section 2
SECTION 4: HOMEWORK
Homework assignments have clear and definite purposes. They are designed to meet one or more of the following aims:
§ To provide the drill necessary for the mastery of the skill.
§ To promote individual and cooperative study and preparation of the course materials.
§ To stimulate creative intellectual activities on the part of the student through solving problems, composition work, etc.
Teachers give daily assignments. The typical student, working diligently, should be able to complete the daily assignment within 30-40 minutes per class. Within this time frame are reports, map work, projects done outside of class, etc. There are homework assignments over the weekend. Students working in more advanced classes do have more work required of them. Students should work on their long-range assignments (such as book reports, term papers, maps, compositions, and lab projects) systematically in order to have adequate time for their day-to-day assignments.
Written work should be neatly presented on standard 8½ × 11 white paper, (no pages torn out from spiral notebooks). Written work should normally be completed in pen of blue or black ink or produced on the computer. Written work should always be grammatically correct and have proper punctuation. Clearly title all work with the student’s name, date, and class. Accepting late work is at the discretion of the individual teacher.

Correct English, written and oral, is insisted upon in every class by every teacher. An example is set in this matter by the teachers themselves.

After an absence, it is the student’s personal responsibility to see his teachers about making up all work he missed. It is the responsibility of the student to turn in all work and to request any exam on his own.

Etiquette Point of the Week
There are times when email is not appropriate. Thank-you or sympathy notes should be written by hand on notepaper (personalized, if you have it) and sent by regular mail. Invitations should always be responded to so the host knows whether or not to expect you. If your invitation says “RSVP” and is followed by a phone number, then you simply call and let the host know whether or not you will attend. If “RSVP” is followed by an address, it means a short note such as “Looking forward to your football party Saturday evening” is expected. If the invitation says “Regrets only,” then you need to respond only if you won’t attend. Be sure you respond promptly. Emily Post’s Teen Etiquette, Elizabeth L. Post and Joan M. Coles; Harper Perennial

Athletics
CONGRATULATIONS to our Pioneer Baseball Team for Tuesday’s win.
Monday, Mar. 14th: STM vs Liberty Christian @ STM; 3:15 p.m.
Tuesday, Mar. 15th: STM vs. San Jacinto @ STM; 3:15 p.m.

Birthdays This Week: None

Homily preached by Fr. Gabriel Stack, O.Praem.
Among other things, Fr. Gabriel is the Headmaster and teaches Latin and Spanish.

We know that God blesses us in various ways each and every day. Today we focus on the blessing which we call “the cross.” This is important because Jesus tell us, “If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”

We typically consider the cross something to avoid if we can and something to complain about if we cannot avoid it. Or, at least, that is my adolescent response. And for that reason I now know why one or the other of my parents seemed to be always saying “offer it up,” or asking “did we say our morning offering yet?”

Why is there a cross when we seek to follow Christ? We cannot heal ourselves. No matter how much our medicine and psychology advances, we have a wound that will not yield to those sciences. Only the cross of Christ can heal us.

Why did salvation come through crucifixion? Part of the reason is that God loves us too much to spoil us. Evil and suffering entered the world because of sin - mankind's rebellion against God. That original disobedience was a free choice, as is every sin.

God respects our freedom; it, too, is His gift to us. We are created in His image. This means that we are neither rodents nor robots. Because God respects our freedom, He also has to respect the consequences of our free choices – even when we make bad choices, even when we sin.

St. Paul wrote once to the Philippians, "He emptied himself... He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death... on a cross." In other words, Jesus turned the consequences of our sin into the remedy for our sin - this is how powerful and complete his love is.

Because of his willingness to suffer out of love for us, our suffering has become a way to unite us more fully with him, the only source of our healing and lasting happiness. Jesus told St. Faustina of the Divine Mercy that one hour of meditation on his passion and crucifixion does more good for our soul than an entire year's worth of other devotions. It is not enough to hang crucifixes on the walls of our churches and homes, to wear crucifixes around our necks, or to dangle them from our rearview mirrors.

To unleash God's transforming power in our lives and our world, we must go deeper and fix the crucifix firmly in our hearts. And we can only do that through prayer, through developing a real and sustained relationship with Jesus Christ.

During this holy Mass, we are truly present at our Lord's crucifixion through the sacrament of the Eucharist. Look upon Him who, as the Holy Victim, lifts us up too. Make a commitment to unite yourself with Him in spiritual reading and in personal prayer every day this Lent. This way the cross will become, more and more, the triumph of Christ's healing love in you and through you.

In publishing this homily, we hope to share a portion of the spiritual treasure by which the students are enriched every day. However, this homily may not be reproduced by the parents or friends of St. Michael’s without written permission of the author.

Prayer Requests
● Giancarlo Medina who is battling cardiac problems
● Francesco Tanzi Grandfather of Mr. Lieggi who is close to death.
● Those who are in the armed forces.
● St. Michael’s older priests and those who care for them.