ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses a statement on the official position of the nature of Catholic schools and their role in the Church and society is in order. Catholic schools were to exist primarily to participate in the Church's salvific mission. Several years before, in a case involving Bible-reading in public schools, the Supreme Court had ruled that government was to be neutral to religion. Embattled, Ireland solicited support for his position from Archbishop Gibbons of Baltimore, at the time the only cardinal in the United States. The movement known as Cahenslyism, named after Peter Cahensly, constitutes an apt illustration of the importance of the ethnic factor in the life of the Catholic Church. There was disagreement between and among the Catholic hierarchy over the school question. Called into being by Pope John XXIII in 1962, the Second Vatican Council was to "open up" the Church to the world.
