“We’re back at it!” Fr. John Foley, SJ used those words in a “60 Minutes” interview about Cristo Rey back in 2004 – that is the same year we opened Cristo Rey St. Martin in Waukegan. He was referencing the Jesuits’ return to educating new immigrant populations in the U.S. and their renewed focus on providing a “preferential option” to the marginalized through the Cristo Rey model of education. Those words, at least in my imagination, echo through our hallways at the start of every school year.
The first day of classes at CRSM begins with an all-school assembly. We coordinate with our Corporate Work Study Program business partners so the students who are working for that day get a late start. It is one of only two times per year that our entire school community gathers together in-person. The other is Senior Send-Off at the end of the school year.
This assembly is a chance for us to return to and refocus on our mission and values. Remember that each year, 25% of the students – the incoming 9th graders – are completely new to CRSM. For them, it is the first of many reminders and for the rest of us, it’s another opportunity to start off on the right foot. Our Principal, Mike Odiotti, does a masterful job of running the show.
As always, we begin with a prayer and, in what is becoming a CRSM tradition for the first day of classes, our students recite the Cristo Rey Credo written by John Foley. The first words of this powerful prayer are:
We all have to be about changing the way things are. Our mission is to make the Kingdom of God concrete in the here and now, in other words, not merely to make things slightly better but to effect transformational change at every level. At Cristo Rey, no one has ever taught that we should be content with doing something small. Our world doesn’t need a touch-up; it needs total renewal!
I take back what I said earlier. It’s not my imagination; Fr. Foley’s words actually do echo through our halls! They resound with a sense of conviction and urgency. I like to say that our culture at CRSM is that we treat others with the same care and respect that each of us would want to be treated. The community we create here (and re-create daily) is a vision for what we want the rest of the world to be like. Not how it currently is. We are very deliberate and intentional about it.
Before the start of assembly, returning students were asked to sit quietly and reflect on their CRSM experiences so far. During assembly our Principal asked for a student to voluntarily share a reflection. Without hesitating one of our rising seniors walked up and took the microphone. Here is what she had to say:
Hello, good morning! I wanted to start by saying thank you, to all the teachers and staff that put their hearts into our curriculum and culture, to make us feel confident to grow in the classroom but also outside in the world. Being at Cristo Rey has been life changing, seriously.
Coming into my first week of freshman training was a step forward to putting myself out there, to make new connections and learn about myself, although I come from a background where I’ve had [some] work experience [it was] not corporate.
[Over my years at CRSM], I got the opportunity to go to the 2024 SUMA Cristo Rey Network Conference, where Cristo Rey Students across the country come together and discuss ways we can make our school feel like home. I’ve learned that… as students, we have the power to do anything, create anything, and change anything. By doing so we make this place feel like a second home.
As I went to the Viatorian Youth Congress this past summer, I met Cristo Rey St. Viator students and …a physics teacher from there. He really resembled… our teachers by being our mentors to teach us how to instill agency and grit.
Having the opportunity to mentor incoming freshmen every summer [during Summer Bridge and our work-study Training Institute] has brought me joy and a reminder that we all start somewhere. Being at Cristo Rey St. Martin College prep and entering my last year here, I can say I am proud to be a student; to be a part of this wonderful community where there is diversity in our thoughts – where growth is welcome.
How much more powerful is this message because it is brought to our students by one of their peers? How perceptive and profound are her words after only three years of being a Cristo Rey St. Martin student?
It is certainly an indicator that we are on the right track. The culture and environment we hope to build at CRSM is, in reality, already here and having an impact. What’s more, the students themselves are paying it forward and spreading the word. Wouldn’t it be great if the rest of the world felt as supported and challenged and called as we do here at CRSM?
I can still hear the final words of the Cristo Rey Credo reverberating throughout the building:
Our world is awash in grace. Grace makes us excited about the future. The Kingdom is coming and we are an essential part of that dream! ¡Viva Cristo Rey!
Do you hear those words, too?