Embarking on an Adventure: Won’t You Join Us?
“An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered; an adventure is an inconvenience rightly considered.”
– G.K. Chesterton from All Things Considered (1908)
First and foremost, we want to thank everyone that came to our Founders Day meeting on the Feast of St. Padre Pio this past Saturday, Sept. 23! We not only shared in fellowship and fun, but learned all the latest developments for Chesterton Academy of St. Padre Pio, and even heard from interested students on why they want to go to Chesterton Academy. Plus, we officially launched our Cultura Vitae Campaign to a truly amazing reception –– not only did we have an incredibly generous benefactor step forward to offer a $25,000 match to kick off our campaign, but we also raised nearly $14,000 in one hour toward that matching goal! Wow! We need to raise the remaining $11,000 by Oct. 1st (the feast day of The Little Flower) to make our matching challenge! The support and prayers we are receiving from our future families and the community at large has been overwhelming! We are so grateful. The hard work is not over yet though, and we have much still to do.
For the past eight months, the Board of Chesterton Academy of St. Padre Pio has been on an adventure. We didn’t set out to be on this adventure, but discerning the will of God and wishing to be obedient to His calling led us to accept the adventure of opening a Chesterton Academy right here in Sarasota for the 2024/2025 school year.
There have been trials –– spiritual warfare raging around us –– but through it all amazing miracles big and small have encouraged us to persevere. The Surrender Novena has helped us stay focused on what we can do and leave the rest for Him to do. It’s been hard: countless hours, thousands of dollars, lots of surrendering and even more praying has gotten us to this point, but the kind of support we saw at our Founders Day reminds us that we are not alone.
Now the Chesterton Schools Network has officially “activated” us to carry out the final phase of opening this school. That means that all the groundwork we’ve been doing over the past several months has been finalized and now we move forward to begin early enrollment, hire staff, build community, solidify our location, and most necessary and vital to it all –– fundraise!
Believe me, we wish we were wealthy enough to do it all on our own and not ever need to ask you for a single penny for this school. But that is not the case. We have put our time, talent and treasure toward this and we won’t ask of you anything we haven’t been willing to do ourselves, but the time for asking is now.
We are required to raise the operating gap of the school before the school year begins, which means we need to raise $530,000 by June 2024. To make this happen, we have officially launched our campaign Culture Vitae (Latin for Culture of Life, a term coined by the late St. Pope John Paul II, another patron of our school and the network). The initial response we received was truly amazing and a blessing to witness. We are so humbled by our donors’ generosity and support. This response has given us joy and continued trust that the Lord will move hearts because we need everyone and anyone who believes in the mission of our lay apostolate of the G.K. Chesterton Society –– to evangelize through education –– to step forward and financially support this school. Can you be a monthly donor for the next 10 months at $50 or $100 a month? Do you have the means to make a one-time donation of $5,000, $10,000 or $25,000?
Chesterton Academy will be a haven of Christian joy, virtue formation and the illumination of the mind. Our curriculum is tried and true. Our students will be exceptionally ready for college, but more importantly, their hearts and minds will be claimed for Christ. They will be the light that shines forth giving hope to those still in darkness. These are not vague promises. This is happening on the campus of all 56 Chesterton Academies currently in operation around the country. We have over 1,000 alumni making an impact on the Church and the culture and more than 20 religious vocations have come from Chesterton Academies. These are real numbers, real people, real impact. We are asking you to join us on this adventure.
“When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.” G.K. Chesterton said that in the early 20th century, but it’s truer today than it was even then. Our society is in a sad state of affairs, but hope remains and one path forward has been laid before us.
Together, we can accomplish much more and together we can thank God for the fruits of our labor. It’s not far off now. Please help us celebrate the opening of Chesterton Academy by supporting us financially and sharing our fundraiser with everyone you know, even if they don’t have high school aged children, or any children at all. This is so much greater than just one school, it truly is a universal unleashing of the Holy Spirit in response to a need of our time. Join us in prayer, join us in community, join us in doing the hard work through giving of your time, talent and treasure. We are grateful to have you with us on this mission to evangelize through education!!
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