Headmaster Newsletters

Hello CANU Community!

Instead of writing a full newsletter, I've simply placed the transcript of my speech at our Gala below. But first, a couple quick follow-up points!

As a community event, our Gala was a resounding success. There was a great unifying of Catholic effort and connection between like-minded and like-driven individuals who care about the formation of these children in our school and others across the diocese. We're so thankful that you came. We're truly blessed to have this community.

As a fundraiser, it was great start. We still have a ways to go, though, to reach our goal of $335,000 by June 30th. If you've committed to financially supporting us already, we owe you a great thanks. If you haven't made that commitment, I encourage you to consider doing so. If you'd like to meet with myself or Martha Ritter about what your involvement could look like, our time is yours.

The faculty and board of the school has been committed to praying to Mother Angelica, founder of EWTN among other things, for the financial success of the school, and we invite you to pray with us and participate in our great, Catholic mission here. I'll have a new Newsletter out in a couple weeks. Thanks everyone!

"Unless you are willing to do the ridiculous, God will not do the miraculous. When you have God, you don't have to know everything about it; you just do it." - Mother Angelica

Mother Angelica, pray for us.
G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards,
Harris Moriarty
Headmaster

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HEADMASTER REMARKS FROM THE CANU ANNUAL GALA 2024

"Good Evening, everyone, and thank you for being here!

12 months ago, I was living in Colorado with my family, and, after some interesting intercessory actions from St. Joseph, a quick jaunt to Utah, multiple conversations, and a lot of time in prayer, I accepted the first full-time position for a *Catholic styled* school, in Utah of all places, that had interest but no officially accepted students, no staff and faculty, no building to populate, and certainly no sign.

Many of you present today were here last year at the inaugural Gala where you heard a lot about a school that *would* be great if we could open it. You might not have known that the Ritters, Wellwerts, Greenfields, Remkes, Mayerles, and many others had, to varying degrees, been working for a year or more at that point to gauge interest, partner with the Chesterton Schools Network, and raise funds to bring reality to a dream. What you saw was a really nice event. You were served and entertained by students who’d probably attend if it opened. You heard from Dale Ahlquist, a fine gentleman and president of the Chesterton Society, and he spoke about the Chesterton Schools Network and the importance of classical education in today’s world. And, of course, you heard from Tom and Martha Ritter about what it would take to open the school from a communal energy and financial support standpoint.

What you didn’t see was a Headmaster – I was dolefully watching my flight get delayed and delayed and delayed and then cancelled. I did write a nice note though that I’ve heard some of you enjoyed when Martha read it. You didn’t see any teachers; no students in uniforms; no slide deck of pictures from a thriving school. Because there was no school yet. And this is Utah! Not Chicago and the Midwest – loaded with multigenerational Catholic families, or the West Coast – a large, sprawling Catholic community galvanized by a culture dead set on wiping them out, or the East coast where Church institutions and schools have been around almost as long as this great nation has existed. This is Utah where many couldn’t find this state on a map before the Olympics were here, and Catholicism is not the dominating contributor to our local culture. This is, of course, in the face of what every good Christian deserves: a quality education, a stable place to practice their faith, and a village to live in. And looking around, you might have wondered where this energy and fundraising was going to come from. The dream wasn’t real yet, and, in the eyes of many supporters, it had a long way to go – maybe too long.

Well, over the months immediately following the Gala, the founders reached their fundraising goal: well over $200k. We accepted our first class of students, hired a complete faculty, signed a lease agreement with our Christian brethren at Bountiful First Baptist and, maybe most importantly, had an official school sign rendered and installed.

So here we are, closing in on the end of our first full year of operation. We’re a student body; we’re a non-profit business; we’re a community; we’re a school.

And we really are a fun school. Our classes are small so we know each other – teachers and students alike. Our schedule can be flexible, so we get to do fun activities like spend a week traveling to other Churches for Mass, or pausing classes for a day to celebrate long held Catholic feasts and traditions like reading Lepanto on Our Lady of Victory, celebrating our patrons like St. Joseph and St. Scholastica, singing for the All Souls Day liturgy, or just eating pasta with our hands. All this wraps into and integrates with a full bodied curriculum replete with disciplines that legitimately build on each other. Our prime example this year goes like this: In History, we’re studying the Roman Republic. In Literature, we’re reading and discussing the Aeneid and the earliest Latin peoples. Philosophy class brings to bear those great minds in that same time frame, and Theology caps it off with a study of the Chosen People in the Old Testament. Throughout the school year, this blurry picture of Ancient Times comes into crystal clear, hi-definition as we approach Christ’s Incarnation. The picture, in focus now, is God’s Will for us, the history of salvation, and the narrative of redemption. Those pieces that will become the Church, not only historically, but you and me as well, will find their place.

And as a foundation and ultimate educational director, we rely on the virtues, wonderful idiosyncrasies, and incisive writings of the school’s namesake, G. K. Chesterton. With a focus on wit, seeing the truths of complementarity behind seemingly extreme paradoxes, and all of it underpinned with a lifelong, enduring child-like attitude – one of wonder, joy, innocence, and love.

The goal of our education is to give our students the tools meant for them. They’ll need those tools to exact their will on their own life having been formed by God’s Will first. They need to learn how to see the good, true, and beautiful all around them, to “close read” the world, as my wife would say, and recognize the workings of the Holy Spirit in their lives from the greatest and most obvious gifts to the wisdom and specialness present in the apparently mundane.

This four-year program has been built out and developed for over 15 years now and is the gold standard for the great harmony of faith and reason in classical education. It’s oriented toward not just achievement in this life but perpetual love and happiness in the next. And it is that higher orientation that more perfectly prepares students to be as they ought to be whether it’s as a scientist or a writer, a speaker or an artist, a priest or spouse, a businessman or religious community member. Across the nation, Chesterton Academies are sources of religious and priestly vocations, student and whole family conversions to the faith, and strong lay communities. We can see many of those same fruits appearing here.

Drawing from the Ogden area, Draper extended, the Eden and Park City locales, we have helped to catalyze a much larger Catholic movement, and if you were at the March for Life, Mass for the Unborn, 40 Days for Life, the Rorate Mass at Saint Mary’s, the Chrism Mass at the Madeleine, the Carmelite Fair, and more, you’ve seen us. While the Founders, the Board, the staff, faculty, and all the parents have worked dutifully to make this all happen, it’s the students who are living it out.

It takes a courageous person to start something that other people have been afraid to try. And it takes particularly special teenagers to be those courageous people in obedience to their parents – and a special shoutout to those families that have raised them. Our students have done so much to make this school a reality. After coming from so many different places and not really knowing each other beforehand, I have witnessed firsthand the development of good, REAL friendships. I have seen them work hard together whether it’s running through Latin conjugations or working on a logic puzzle on a festival day. I have seen them come face-to-face with the biggest worry in a classroom - being called on and not knowing the answer – and watch them come out the other end mostly unscathed. I’ve seen them face the actual biggest fear of your average teenager – taking something seriously and not being good at it. That takes real courage even for adults, and I’ve seen them start to become comfortable with it. They’re the ones at Mass every day, beginning and ending every day in prayer, balancing the difficulty of expectations, homework, family responsibilities, and all the other things they want to do with their time. They’re doing the real work of the Chesterton curriculum – actively taking part in their own formation. It’s a paradox Chesterton would appreciate – in order to be formed by God, we have to say yes to Him in all of our actions, words, and choices. We can’t be formed without our own active participation.

As my remarks come to a close here, I want to point out a few accomplishments of our students. If you haven’t already seen, there’s a gallery behind you of selected works to showcase from their Art class. In a couple of minutes, they’ll be regaling us with their work in music. They’ve read 4 ancient epics this year. They’ve almost completed a review of the entire Old Testament from the Torah to the Jewish Diaspora following the Babylonian Exile. They *led* the March for Life. They joined the Pueri Cantores international Catholic music movement with their performance at the Madeleine this past February. And this brings me to my final commentary on their achievements.

The first National Latin Exam was given in 1978, and, since 1998, well over 100k students from across the globe take the assessment every year. It is a discipline unifying test that judges the veracity of a school’s Latin curriculum and the tenacity of the students that study it across time, geography, and demographic. For a school in its first year, it is one of the few ways to judge, apples to apples, how we fair against the rest. This year, out of our 8 students, 6 were awarded certificates of distinction, meaning that they scored above the national average. And out of those 6, 3 were awarded the distinction Summa Cum Laude, meaning they scored in the top 10% of all test takers. And that distinction comes with a medal. So, given that the students are preparing to come on stage in a moment to perform, I’d like to ask that a parent from each of these students please come and collect their student’s medal for them. Their names are: Ronak Tathireddy, Gemma Wellwerts, and Britta Mercier.

You are here at this Gala because you are an avid supporter, you are looking for that strong, Christian community, you want what our school is doing for your own children or grandchildren, you heard about us and wanted to see if we’re the real thing, or you’re somebody’s plus one to a nice event with an open bar. Regardless of how or why you’re here, I’ll only ask a couple things. First, allow yourself to be moved. Recognize the work that’s being done and what that means for the people doing it. Second, walk away with a steeling of your heart to stand for the good and a levity in your soul to laugh joyously at everything life is. Maybe you have a special service to provide or a talent to give. Maybe on the drive home the name of someone who needs CANU pops into your mind. Maybe a life of professional success has positioned you well to help a dream turned reality overcome its financial impediments. What I want you to know is YOU have a place here, and I know it because God wouldn’t have brought you here otherwise.

All the students have been working very hard, and they’re really excited to perform for you all this evening. Thank you for your time, thank you for your support, and thank you for coming.

I think you’ll really enjoy this next part."

Hey CANU Community!

As a recap, we did some amazing things in the last month. We participated in the Pueri Cantores concert at the Madeleine with a few other local Catholic choirs. It was truly a wonderful opportunity for our students. Many Chesterton students have never and would never, on their own, be able to participate in an event like that because of various impediments, but, here, we are flush with these opportunities and the flexibility to provide them. In art class, the students are all working toward proficiency in charcoal works, sketching live pieces, a little bit of painting, and beautiful calligraphy! Other notable events were viewing the new movie, Cabrini, which comes with a whole conversation in itself, but was definitely worth seeing. We also took the students last week to join in praying the rosary with the 40 Days for Life movement in SLC. I went on a recruiting and admissions relations trip to Wyoming Catholic College last week to both introduce our school to them in earnest for potential future students and to lay some foundations for their graduates to view us as a viable option for their possible teaching vocations.

Coming up, we have a very important Open House series this Saturday, March 23rd from 9am-Noon and on Monday, March 25th during the school day for anyone wishing to observe Chesterton Academy education in the flesh. You can find all the details on our website. It’s one thing to talk about the school (goodness knows I do it a lot!), but it’s an entirely different thing to come here and be here. It’s all theoretical until you see it and know the people who are a part of it. Fundamentally, we are a community because education requires relationship to be meaningful, and to join our school requires giving us a chance to invite families into the community and make those relationships. If you’ve been on the outside looking in for awhile, I *invite* you to come say hello, meet our staff & faculty, our students, our families, and other individuals who’ve chosen to join us along the way. Let us tell you about who we are and why we’re here!

As many of you know, our Gala tickets are on sale now (Saturday, April 20th). Please visit the webpage for all pertinent information. We’re also providing tiered sponsorships for those individuals and organizations that are looking for a venue to promote their businesses to good, God-fearing men and women! The Gala is one of our primary methods of sharing our mission outside of the school itself. It is at its root equal parts fundraiser and community-building. If you or someone you know is interested in being a sponsor, please reply back to this email.

My thoughts this month are all about community. We hear it a lot. Parish communities. School communities. Neighborhood communities. And the word “community” engenders an idea of a collective which is appropriate and technically true, but a real community isn’t limited by its overarching and sometimes strict definitions. It’s really defined by the individuals who are a part of it. When people say, “there’s no community here” or “the community is why I stay”, they’re remarking on whether the “community” is made of welcoming or repulsing members, active or passive, conscientious or self-centered. Communities are always present, but they have varying degrees of success. This success is dictated by whether the individuals within the community are conscious of why they’re there. Underneath it all, a community exists to communicate certain truths about its purview, and a community that isn’t conscious of the truth it purports is going to do it poorly.

This is to say, when I greet this listserv with my affectionate “Hey CANU Community!”, there’s meaning behind that choice of words. It’s not just that you or your family has been identified as having a mild association with or interest in the school. It’s that through some direct means or maybe even by chance or happenstance, we have found each other, know that certain things are true, and are committed to living a life in concert with one another to those ends. This may mean that your children attend here. Or that you pray for us from afar. Or you step onto our board or a volunteer committee because you have an incisive talent to support us. But, in the end, this community is made up of you and the relationships that you have within it.

I cannot stress the necessity of relationship enough. Our entire educational philosophy is built on the idea that wisdom and understanding can only have a path of transference when the students and teachers actually KNOW each other. Otherwise, it’s just a transmission of data that lacks the context of the person sending it, the person receiving it, and the information itself. How can we share the wonder and joy of G.K. Chesterton if we’re missing the wondrous and joyous context of Mr. Lapointe, Joseph Oppedisano, and the hypostatic union? I could tell you who they are or what it is, but it is our relationship to those individuals and concepts that bring fulfillment in life with them because you and I are important pieces, too. A relationship must be open to reception as well as self-gift, and a thriving community elicits that healthy duality out of its members.

As we close down the Lenten season and prepare to celebrate the octave of Easter, I hope you’ll meditate on those concepts of relationship and community as they relate to the Great Commission. Catholicism in Utah is exploding with American immigrants from across the country, and Easter Vigils around the diocese will humble you with the conversions happening right here in our Churches. Are we ready for them? Our school is! And we want you with us.

Our plans for next year and beyond are only getting bigger both in school-size and mission scope, and our ability to grow is largely dependent on the growth of our community. I hope to see you at our Open Houses and the Gala, and I ask that you consider who in your life you can bring!

Tomorrow we'll celebrate Saint Joseph's Day as a school by praying the rosary and his litany as well as by an Italian tradition of eating a bunch of pasta (by hand!) and homemade cream puffs for lunch - alla pasta tavola. Many prayers to you and yours and a blessed, repentant Lent! Next time I send this missive, we’ll be living it up with the Risen Lord!

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Saint Patrick, pray for us.
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards,

Harris Moriarty
Headmaster

Hello CANU Community!

We’ve had a great start to the second semester of our first year in operation. We celebrated Saint Athanasius’ feast day in January with a Latin Trivia competition and an adventure race that included logic games, pelting snowballs at Jack Frost (an old Athanasius Day tradition), and watching Arius lose in fisticuffs to Saint Nick (played by our own Nicholas Lapointe). We represented the Pro-Life movement in prayer at the Mass for the Unborn at the Cathedral and in protest of vile, abortive practices at the March for Life. Our pastor at St. Olaf’s took a trip to Australia, and, in his absence, we took the school on the road for Mass visiting Holy Family, the Cathedral, Saint John the Baptist, Saint Ambrose, Saint Catherine of Siena Newman Center, and the Carmelite monastery in Holladay. We also took time last week to observe Saint Scholastica’s Feast Day (our school patron).

All the while, we pushed through the Oresteia (a detailing of Agamemnon’s family downfall following the Iliad), worked through the city-states of Ancient Greece and Alexander the Great’s empire, studied the book of Samuel 1 and David’s rise to King of Israel, and began a preliminary study of physics among many other things.

Today, we celebrate Ash Wednesday. Although not a Holy Day of Obligation, it has become one of the more culturally important days of the American Catholic. It has been popularized in recent years with social media graphics giving names the different kinds of ash splotches on the forehead, pictures of talking heads showing up to televised work with their ashes remaining, and many adults and students conspicuously absent for the morning to attend Ash Wednesday services. In our own kind of bat signal, it's a sign that we’re still here. If you felt alone as a Catholic in this world this morning, you’ll spend your day out and about remembering that you are not. And like all good Catholic traditions, when someone asks you what it’s all about, you have to say death and hope and Resurrection. Because in these Ashes on our foreheads made of the palms from last year’s Palm Sunday which symbolize the unwitting celebration of a King on a donkey arriving to meet our sinful doom and his salvific destiny, we admit our downfall and espouse a hope in Christ’s grace… through repentance.

Repentance means to literally change your mind. To understand something differently than the way you once did. Any convert knows this feeling especially the formerly ardent atheist, agnostic, or anti-Catholic ones. Any change requires discipline, and this kind of change requires spiritual discipline. In this, we are so lucky to have St. Scholastica as a patron at CANU.

Her name sounds a lot like “school” (and that’s very important), but recent decades have put a little more school into Scholastica than the other way around. In preparation for last week’s observance, I stumbled upon a prayer to her. Here is a small portion of it:

"O God, show us where innocence leads… that we may so live in innocence as to attain to joys everlasting…”

Scholastica lived in a convent almost her entire adult life (founded it herself alongside Benedict, her brother, and the one he founded 5 mi away). One might think that a simple life as that would seem a place where great innocence could be protected and elongated outside the reach of us “normal” people who live out here with families and jobs and the reality of a broken world. The Enlightenment has stripped many of us of our innocence, and so the concept of reclaiming it seems impossible… can God confound reality?

The real reality is not that Scholastica lived a sheltered life, but that she built the shelter through an exceedingly disciplined and ascetic one. Similar to her brother, she had been blessed with wisdom to craft a community which required, as a backbone, a rule of prayer; as the muscle, a rule of work; as the heart, a rule of life. In our free and creative society, it seems strange that set form and matter would be so quintessential to understanding abstract qualities such as innocence and joy. It is in fact only the mastering of the concrete that provides a foundation to attain the abstract. Doing your life well today when it hurts makes it possible to enjoy your life tomorrow and ever after.

We need to put Scholastica back into “school”. In the occasional conversation, some might ask if it’s really necessary to go to Mass everyday as a school. If you look at it as only having to go once a week on the Sabbath, then, no, you don’t have to go everyday. And that's fine for many. If you look at it as coming from a daily commitment to breaking and changing the way that I understand my own creation, my own salvation, believe the impossible is possible with God, believe that as He can heal the lepers with His touch, He can cure me of my sin, I don’t know what else to do than go to God every day in the sacrament.

Repenting is impossible for us. And yet, on this Ash Wednesday (as with all Ash Wednesdays), we are commanded to repent. Our Church supports us liturgically by dedicating these next 40 days to changing our mind. To say through our prayers, words, and actions: it is not impossible for God to replete me with innocence once again. It is not impossible for God to make me as a child once more. Saint Scholastica is our model for a reason. The form and matter of the spiritual life is real, but it takes “discipline”. Not just in the hard, but in the fun, too. Live the Sabbath. Do the Feasts. Go to Mass. Pray unceasingly.

If we’re doing our job here at CANU, we’re imbedding the form of lay asceticism within a life lived in a world that hates prayer. That’s why our calendar is full, and we make teenagers do things that they think are lame. Last semester, it was helping the Carmelites with their Fair, playing mythology trivia, singing for All Souls Day Mass, and meditating on God’s Hand in history. This semester, it’s the Maccabean Revolt and protecting the Holy of Holies, the Annual Gala, pasta alla tavola on St. Joseph’s Day, and wearing our ashes proudly on Ash Wednesday. But all throughout, we begin and end each day with prayer. We pray our rosary every week. We go to Mass every day. And in all things we yearn to proclaim the Glory of God.

If you haven’t had a chance to come to the school, or you and I haven’t had a chance to meet in person, or you’d like to know me or the school a bit better than you do now, I humbly invite you into the fold. The Ghost of Christmas Present would say, “Come in here and know me better, man!” In just a little over a week our students will be participating in a wonderful, Catholic music concert at the Cathedral. Admission is free, and details can be found here. We also have a couple Open Houses coming up in March, and tickets for the Gala in April should be going up soon. These are all good opportunities to come and know us a bit better, and I hope you’ll take us up on them! Maurisa Mayerle, our social media director, has also been working hard on publishing regular content on our activities and upcoming functions (various links below). Come follow us and take a look!

Have a wonderfully repenting Lent. I hope all of you come to know Christ better in your lives through the fasting and joys that come with changing your mind toward the Lord.

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Saint Valentine, pray for us.
Saints Cyril & Methodius, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards,

Harris Moriarty
Headmaster

Merry Christmas CANU Community!

Today marks the end of our first term as a school! The students completed the gauntlet of finals and are now heading into a much-deserved break from their studies. This last month was a busy one but the kind of busy that fulfills rather than distracts. The students and our music director (John Payne) put on a beautiful Lessons & Carols that many of you attended. It took a lot of rehearsal and fortitude to make it what it was. As a Chesterton Academy, music is not just for the inclined but is a study for the whole school regardless of natural talent. It took courage for many of our students to perform, and they did it beautifully (linked here). We had another festival day, this time for Saint Ambrose. One of our students crafted a very clever “escape room” for each of the houses to solve, and we even played basketball under snowfall. Our classes each ended with anticipation of what’s to come in addition to a literal examination of where we’ve been. And we head to break with the relief after a race hard won but the excitement to get after it again once we have rested a bit.

Speaking of anticipation, the new year brings some exciting things to our school life. Firstly, through the tenacity and grace of many members of our community, we were able to provide important financial support of Pro-Life Utah and as a result are a named sponsor. We’ll be walking with them at the front of March for Life in Salt Lake City on January 20th. Women from our community will gather on the Epiphany for the inaugural Epiphany Tea on Saturday, January 6th. Our school choir has been invited to join the rest of the diocese for a wonderful concert at the cathedral on February 23rd (more details to come). CEDE, a Christian non-profit started out of the Catholic University of America, has provided us a curriculum to introduce a short, monthly program to teach entrepreneurial principles to our students. We’ll be implementing that in the coming semester. We’ll have a couple more Open Houses in March, our Gala in April, oh and by the way, completing the admissions process for next year’s freshmen!

In all these good things though, while they may make us busier, we must remain focused on Him. Our Christmas Break is situated such that our school families can celebrate the twelve days of Christmas together. Our Easter break lasts the length of Holy Week and the Easter octave. We will go to Mass as often as our parish here, St. Olaf’s, will let us. Mr. Lapointe is developing a unique and regular program for a more pastoral take on the faith, so that it’s not just about the form. We are establishing relationships with local clergy to facilitate their regular presence in our halls. Our days start and end with prayer, and, in all things, the just accountability and study of a highly disciplined and thorough classical curriculum is buttressed (literally held up) by considerations of the infinite mercy of Jesus Christ.

Recently, Mercy has been on my heart. I was once told that the Old Testament’s meandering story of the Israelites’ wanderings, plights, and angerings of God was not as much a narrative of God constantly rescuing his sinful creations but rather that over and over and over again an undeserving nation begged for mercy and it was granted. Did it eliminate hardship or the realities of a sinful world? No. But it establishes a trust and hope in the Lord through repetitive occurrences and therefore an inductive proof of sorts that God loves us, and we can rely on Him. Sometimes these consolations do not appear as we desire – similar to the Israelites’ dream of a warrior Messiah to overthrow the Romans. I pray that this Christmas season brings each of your homes the openness to accept God’s consolations as they are in the face of your tribulations. I ask those prayers in return for my own family and our little school here in Bountiful as we continue to move forward with faith albeit with the occasional adversity.

Many Blessings to you and yours this Christmas season, and may the Love of the Holy Family and Light of the Star of David rest on your homes this year.

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards,

Harris Moriarty
Headmaster

Hello CANU Community!

We've had a fantastically busy last month which is everything that one wants out of a school. Our classes and students continue to be alive with wonder and joy. We recently wrapped up Ancient Egypt in History, Science has completed the race to the discovery of Gravity, and Literature has completed the Iliad. We celebrated the Feast of Saint Augustine with a full House Day that was replete with a round robin Ping Pong tournament matched with a poetry recitation competition that offered works from Edgar Allen Poe, Shakespeare, William Blake, and G.K. Chesterton (of course) to name just a few - Chrysostom House won the day.

We held two Open Houses (and don't forget the virtual Open House tonight with the Chesterton Network), had a wonderful men's night in Eden for our annual Bourbon & Burnt Ends gathering, and we were even invited to vocally accompany a local All Soul's liturgy. We've met members of various LDS and Christian communities, all of whom have shown great interest in our work and are just so pleased that this work is here in Utah.

I find it particularly satisfying to be sending this note on the Feast of Albertus Magnus who is mostly known as the man who helped make Saint Thomas Aquinas into what he became through his mentorship. Less known today, he is the primary conduit for Greek philosophy, especially Aristotle, into the Modern world. Without his philosophical commentaries, Ancient wisdom would have remained outside the greater Catholic academic institutions of his time and for a long time after. Which likely would have robbed us of Aquinas' accomplishments which have been central to Catholic thought from the moment he put quill to paper.

The relationship there is so clear to me. Aquinas, one of the greatest Catholic minds to ever live, needed someone, a teacher, to unlock wisdom for him to access it, and, on the shoulders of these giants, we aim to model that same concept. Through mentorship, through unique passions of individuals, through the classic sources of Western canon, a Chesterton Academy curriculum experienced within the confines of a quality mentorship, unlocks access to Wisdom. And, when capitalized to emphasize the transcendental quality of being wise, Wisdom is best referred to as Sophia - the poetic nomination of the Holy Spirit. Albertus Magnus' mentorship of Thomas Aquinas did not simply unlock academic knowledge and genius, it unlocked the faith and catalyzed a Saint. This is what's at stake (and what is also beautiful) - the salvation of a soul.

In Science class, we posited the following underlying premise of the universal gravitational force:

The existence and action (or lack of action) of matter affects and is affected by the existence and action (or lack of action) of all other matter.

We cannot ignore the affect we have on others or that we are also affected both physically AND spiritually. So why not do as Albertus Magnus did and trust the Holy Spirt to guide you through? Incidentally, the Chesterton Schools Network is in the middle of a 50-day prayer commitment asking for the descent of the Holy Spirit upon our work and our communities concluding on the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe - an event that converted millions within days. It is never too late to join in prayer, and we'd be thankful for the support. I've attached the prayer at the bottom of this email.

Before you hear from me in this way again, we'll have the virtual Open House (tonight - register through the link at the top) and our Lessons & Carols program here at the school on the evening of Thursday, December 7th (more details to come). Faith formation is hardly linear, but I have had the profound pleasure of watching our students work this semester. I hope you can join us in December. It'll be a wonderful show.

Have a restful and merry Thanksgiving and blessings to all of your families!

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Blessed Albertus Magnus, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards,

Harris Moriarty
CANU Headmaster

Good Afternoon CANU Community!

We’re halfway through October, and, as my newborn doubles in age, so does the school year! The last four weeks have brought many opportunities to learn, grow, and serve, and I’ll humbly summarize some of the occasions here. We were patrons at the Carmelite Fair and offered our able-bodied students (and their equally willing parents) for the breakdown of the festival. The joyful response to our charity was wonderful to receive and a reminder that our work extends beyond the classroom - it is to instill a Love of Christ and see him in others. Our ribbon cutting ceremony, aside from a pair of LUCKY shears, was a beautiful opportunity to publicly share our mission with our partners here at Bountiful First Baptist and the city of Bountiful. We weren’t sure how well attended it would be, but God’s grace abounds. The parking lot was full, and Mayor Kendalyn Harris made a lovely appearance. We enjoyed fellowship with our current community and made many new additions to the family. With the diocesan priests out on their convocation, we made arrangements to attend Mass with the Carmelites as that was the only Mass we could logistically manage. For many of our students, it was the first time they witnessed a cloistered vocation, and what a beautiful witness they are! As they say among the Carmelites, they get to live “in God’s House”.

Finally, our school took off the last two periods of class last Friday to observe the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, but more accurately we meditated on its original name - Our Lady of Victory. We discussed the disunity felt by a Christendom suffering from the recent fallout of the Reformation and the accompanying despair that heralded the coming Ottoman Turks to reclaim Spain, the Adriatic, the Mediterranean, and, the prized jewel, Rome. Instead the Turks met a man named Don Jon of Austria who, with some divinely inspired creativity and a nation praying simultaneous rosaries across the continent, met the Turks at sea outnumbered 2-1 and came back victorious anyway. We prayed a rosary together with the Litany of Loreto, and we did a table reading of G.K. Chesterton’s Lepanto which poetically depicts the circumstances surrounding the battle and the battle itself. Sometimes the Glory of God is best understood in a masterwork of art.

Thronging of the thousands up that labour under sea
White for bliss and blind for sun and stunned for liberty.

There are few things as joy-inducing than the recognition that we are free. Many of us have only a few opportunities in life to feel that, and it lasts only for moments under the most perfect of circumstances. And in those moments, we feel God’s providence, and we see His Works. But what about the rest of the time? What about the rest of our lives? How often do we stand stunned for liberty?

I can only say that our embarkment on this path to found a school has me stupefied on many an occasion. Some days, it seems like the whole world is a sickle and hammer inching towards slicing and dashing us to pieces. Some days it’s a crescent swallowing us from all sides. Other days, it’s a flag or a headline that makes us want to move into a deep wood where we can hoard our prized jewels in protection from everyone. But even as the walls feign to close in, we must hold the joy of freedom in our hearts and hands. It is only a reckless joy, an abounding love, an unconditional trust that keeps us on the path of Christ because, as Don Jon of Austria knew and we know now, too, the battle is already won.

My students have recently learned in history that no physical empire lasts, and the laws of earth are bound to be repeated over and over again. Greed, terror, power, control - these are things that the world convinces Man to seek. Time and again, we see that it always ends in self-destruction. In the Iliad, our students are seeing the results of lives built on hubris, and in Science we’re learning about the difficulties that come with recognizing Truth and propagating it when the zeitgeist is firmly planted against it. Same issues across different millennia. A solid education can put so much of our life in context and creates the freedom to choose our own good - God’s Will even.

In light of the blessings we continue to receive, we’re excited to open our Early Enrollment for the next school year. We have a good list of interested candidates, but we have room for more and hope to meet them in the coming weeks. If you’d like to help advertise our Open Houses, we have various pieces of marketing collateral to share. We also have a couple billboards up and down I-15 promoting those days. Keep your eyes out for a blip on one of those digital boards (Layton, South Salt Lake, South Jordan - going north)! Your prayers are equally welcome. As always, we thank you for your continued support and ask for your continued help in spreading the word of our mission here.

Please have a blessed rest of your October and feel free to reach out to me with any inquiries or comments through my email: headmaster@chestertonutah.com.

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Our Lady of Victory, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards and God Bless,

Harris Moriarty
CANU Headmaster

Good Afternoon CANU Community!

Our school year started three weeks ago, and we have seen the blessings of doing the Lord’s work already. There are budding friendships among students and staff, a developing and prayerful relationship with our local parish, and a growing presence and visibility within the respective Catholic communities from Ogden through Salt Lake City down to Draper and even out to Park City. An affirmation of Murphy’s law has also emerged. Many of you know that my wife went into labor a full month early and on the night before the first day of school no less! Thankfully, the CANU staff and faculty are made up of a quality and grit that allowed my family time to celebrate and welcome this new life despite the first gear turnings of the CANU machine being underway.

It is no small thing to start a school. We knew that going in and are continuing to learn the depth of it as we go. I have described the experience so far as akin to building the plane while we fly it. As a part of the Chesterton Schools Network, we are blessed with many resources and academic support from a national colloquium of trailblazers who have often already experienced a problem or can at least offer solidarity and go through it with you. Recently, the CSN released about a quarter of “3.0”which is a very polished compendium of the curriculum with tight and clear guidelines, overviews, lesson plans, and resources. At the same time, we’re learning that our largest cost factor will likely be the amount of PAPER and INK that we use in a given year – something that had only been alluded to! We’re also managing the wonderful convenience of rail transportation to bring in students from the North and South and all the logistics required to utilize it effectively with the volunteer parents and vehicles on hand.

And yet, with all of those things, a school is what we have, and our culture and tradition are well on their way to legacy. One of the primary goals of our curriculum is to remake, entrench, and habituate wonder, and a hallmark of that is astronomy in the early days of 9th grade Science. For two weeks now, the students have had an opportunity to look upward, gaze, and wonder at the same sky that humanity has wondered at for 10,000 years, the same night sky that Christ looked up to in prayer to His Father. In Math, Mr. Lapointe is leading them through Euclid’s Elements where the Beauty of the relationships between objects in space together is restored from the dry, contemporary calculations of geometry and polygons. Each subject, in context with each other, re-establish and reaffirm the beauty and wonder of Creation and our place in it.

We also celebrated our first festival day! Each month we set aside the schoolbooks for a time to engage in fellowship and competition amongst our “Houses”. Five of these festival days are full days named for each of the four houses and one dedicated to Our Lady – Chrysostom(Sept), Augustine (Nov), Ambrose (Dec), Athanasius (Jan), and Our Lady of Fatima (May). They competed in Greek Mythology Trivia, orating St. Chrysostom sermons, sentence diagram relays, and 3-on-3 basketball. It was a full day and an absolute treat to be fed by the families of the Chrysostom House for lunch. In November, the House will compete in poetry recitation, and I look forward to sharing how that goes with you all.

This morning (Friday, 9/15), we attended Mass as a school at St. Olaf’s as we do every day (excepting Mondays when Mass is unavailable in person), and our office administrator, Julie Wellwerts, had occasion to run into another Mass attendee, a mother that no one had met before. In the ensuing conversation, this mother expressed deep excitement that her 8th grader might have a quality school to attend nearby their home, and she also expressed deep hope that there might be room for her son from a family with their circumstances. These are the people that we are desperate to meet. There are families that are looking to be served, and they don’t know about us yet. I’m hopeful that as we get closer to our Open Houses in October that many of you will help spread the word that we’re open, and we’re here for YOU.

Please have a blessed rest of your September and feel free to reach out to me for any inquiries or comments through my email: headmaster@chestertonutah.com.

G. K. Chesterton, pray for us.
Saint Scholastica, pray for us.
Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us.
Mary, Cause of Our Joy, pray for us.

Best regards and God Bless,

Harris Moriarty
CANU Headmaster