Town Hall III

The Concerned Parents, Donors, and Alumni of Jesuit High School, Sacramento,

present their

Third Zoom Town Hall Meeting.

“Updates from Battle. Protecting Your Children. Hope Moving Forward.”

Wednesday, November 17, 2021, 5 p.m. Pacific | 8 p.m. Eastern

At this Third Town Hall, the Concerned Parents, Donors, and Alumni of Jesuit High School Sacramento will provide updates from Canon Law challenges now underway across the country, including in response to methods many Catholic school administrators now deploy to evade parent, donor, and alumni detection of classroom teachings, while attacking parents who complain; but there are success stories too. An esteemed school psychologist will weigh in on the effects of harmful and factional content on children. A national leader in the movement against radicalization will share the breadth of the threat and the extreme unpopularity of these teachings with parents. And two Catholic educators will share the good news of a classical education movement being adopted by more and more Catholic schools and dioceses.

The continuing purpose of the Concerned Parents’ Town Hall series is to stress that you are not alone, that these teachings are wrong, misguided, and damaging, and that remedies exist. You are in the vast majority of those who look on in shock as so many of our schools – private, Catholic, and public – have embraced radicalism to the exclusion of authentic education (and in the case of the Catholic schools, authentic Catholic education). The Concerned Parents of Jesuit High School (Sacramento) have emerged as national leaders in their own right, bringing words of both hope and resistance to Catholic school parents across the country. (The Concerned Parents, Donors and Alumni of Jesuit High School, Sacramento, are not endorsed by or associated with any Jesuit school, including Jesuit High School, Sacramento, their school of origin.)

Please join us for this important program:

• Moderator:

• Christopher Bakes, BA, JD. Chris is a former Navy JAG, and a trial attorney at one of the nation’s largest law firms. Chris, entirely educated in Catholic schools, has had a 50-year plus association with the Jesuits, attending Jesuit High School (Sacramento), USF undergrad, and USF Law. At the request of the California Jesuits and the Diocese of Sacramento, Chris directed and oversaw the opening of Sacramento’s Cristo Rey High School (a college preparatory school model for the poor), and served on the diocesan school board. Chris is on the leadership team of the Concerned Parents, Alumni and Donors of Jesuit High School (Sacramento)*, ground zero for a growing national movement seeking to correct wayward teachings across the country. Chris is on the National Board for the group No Left Turn in Education, a multi-cultural, multi-state, and multi-racial national movement dedicated to advancing sound teaching in the nation’s public schools. [The Concerned Parents groups across the country typically use their origin school as a means of identification, and not to connote a formal or informal affiliation with the school.]

• Panelists:

• Laura Morrison, JD, JCD, Ph.D, our Canon Lawyer representing the signatories on the mandate initiating the canonical process against Jesuit High School (Sacramento), will speak to what is now her national experience dealing with these secular radical teachings in many Catholic schools, their apparent origins from the same playbook, and the commonalities apparent throughout the national Roman Catholic school system. Laura will also continue to describe proper evidence-gathering. Representative of Dr. Morrison’s work are her letter to the Bishop of the Diocese of Sacramento, found at https://www.faithnotrace.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/letter-board-canon-lawyer-080921.pdf, and to the Provincial of the Jesuits West Province, found at https://www.faithnotrace.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Canon-Lawyer-letter-060421.pdf.
• Colleen Warshawer, BA, Ed.S, a school psychologist from New Mexico who specializes in the treatment of children and adolescents with severe post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) from abuse and neglect, will speak to the great damage being inflicted on the vulnerable young by, in effect, imposing on them an original sin that (according to these teachings) even God is helpless to remove. She will also speak to the guidance parents can share with their young who remain in schools affected by these teachings.
• Elana Fishbein, DSW, MSW, BSW, is founder and President of the national grassroots movement No Left Turn in Education (https://www.noleftturn.us/), and will speak to the national threat to children and the nation posed by these teachings. Dr. Fishbein has extensive professional background in the nonprofit field. Dr. Fishbein’s focus has been on the disadvantaged children, youth and their families from low-income and distressed communities. Her experiences covered a broad spectrum of concerns related to education (formal and informal) and welfare issues, particularly child abuse, neglect and violence in the family. Dr. Fishbein’s early training was in clinical social work, and as she advanced in her career she focused on planning, policy, management and research. Dr. Fishbein was an organizational consultant for many years. Dr. Fishbein earned her a bachelor’s degree in Social Work from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In her masters at Rutgers University, she concentrated on designing social change. Her interest in maximizing service effectiveness, efficiency and impact led her to the doctoral program at the University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice. Combined with course work at the Wharton Business School, she specialized in management and program evaluation. Dr. Fishbein grew up in Israel and served in the Israel Defense Forces. She resides in the suburbs of Philadelphia.
• Andrew Seeley, Ph.D, tutor (professor) at Thomas Aquinas College, and co-founder of the Institute for Catholic Liberal Education. This movement is designed to elevate and disseminate the timeless truth and wisdom of Catholic teachings. Professor Seeley and the Institute both advocate for better formation of our young, so that they will be men and women for the ages – inspired by wisdom, and not servants to secular radicalism. This new movement has been embraced by hundreds of Catholic schools and dioceses across the country, including the Archdiocese of Denver and its schools. (Seehttps://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/249274/for-catholic-school-teachers-new-credential-program-promises-formation-in-faith-and-reason.) This will enable parents, donors and alumni to see that there is a path forward directed by Catholicism and the best of Western Civilization, and that diversion into radical secularism flies in the face of all this.
• Michael van Hecke, M.Ed, is the President and co-founder of the Institute for Catholic Liberal Education and the Catholic Textbook Project, and continues to serve in an emeritus role as President of St. Augustine Academy, Ventura (CA) (https://saintaugustineacademy.com/education/) and will speak to the theme of the promising initiatives already underway, and how any parish, diocese, archdiocese or school can look to the Institute for guidance and inspiration, particularly including in the area of the formation of our young. For a sample of his writings and pastoral approach to the teaching of the young, please see https://saintaugustineacademy.com/catholic/.

Please share this with those you think may be interested in what may well be the great cause of our time. Participation is confidential, and all lists are maintained confidentially by counsel.