Arthur Leary - Catholic Education Superstar

Rt. Reverend Monsignor Arthur Michael Leary
Born: December 15, 1903
Died: May 19, 1968
Relation to Author: Grand Uncle
Brother of Helen Keenan (nee Leary)

Monsignor Leary's obituaries referred to the major role he had in state and national Catholic curriculum reform. However those references were not specific. In this post, we'll look at what Monsignor Leary did to change curriculum in Catholic schools at that state and national level.

First, let's get some historical context. In 1938, Pope Pius XI gave Catholic University in Washington, DC a special assignment on the anniversary of its golden jubilee (which seems like being given a special homework assignment on your birthday). The Pope was concerned about, "the global spread of theories and doctrines that he believed undermined Christianity." The Pope's directive, given more detail by the United States Bishops, "instructed the University to prepare materials of instruction in citizenship and Christian social living for use in the Catholic schools of the United States."

Monsignor Leary, in an interview with the North Country Catholic, said all of this work at revamping Catholic school curriculum was necessary because,

The strong secular spirit of American education during the nineteenth century had somewhat affected our Catholic school system. Our schools did not measure up to the Catholic ideal that religion and philosophy are the unifying forces of a sound educational system.

The commission at Catholic University began its work in 1939. You can see the results of the work by Catholic University here. The commission's work had three areas: an information service (public relations, press, periodicals), an elementary school curriculum called Guiding Growth in Christian Social Living, and textbooks and Basal readers for students. The curriculum (3 volumes) was produced between 1944 and 1946 and is described this way:

The materials they created are the first general curriculum offered to Catholic schools for their use in developing ideals of Christian doctrine for daily living [emphasis added].

While the commission was carrying out its work, Monsignor Leary was there at Catholic University studying for his master's degree. I have no evidence however that he worked on the curriculum while there. (I'll inquire to get a definitive answer.) Monsignor Leary graduated in 1943, after which he was named Secretary of Education for the Ogdensburg diocese.

In 1947 Monsignor Leary began working with the five upstate New York dioceses to develop and implement a single Catholic school curriculum across the dioceses using Guiding for Growth as the framework. Each summer the dioceses held workshops to develop the curriculum for their schools. Monsignor Leary, in describing how extensive the curriculum was, said in the same interview referenced above,

Text books for social studies, English, etc. are written by Catholics for Catholics and with a thoroughly Catholic spirit. In this way the teachings of the Popes and our entire Catholic philosophy are brought to the student not merely in religion but in every subject.

So Monsignor Leary had a major role in completely changing the curriculum of the five upstate dioceses. But he did not stop there; he continued his work nationally, serving at the National Catholic Educational Association, where from 1949-1951 he was National President of the Catholic School Superintendents (his name is listed if you follow the link), a group within the NCEA. (Note that two years after serving as president, in 1953, Arthur Leary was awarded the honor of Domestic Prelate with the right to the title of Rt. Reverend Monsignor almost definitely due to this education work.)

I might have more on his national work if I can get a hold of this book, but in the meantime, we can assume that as President of Catholic School Superintendents, he continued to promote / facilitate the complete revamping of curriculum in dioceses across the country with Guiding for Growth as the model.

In case I haven't done a great job of making this sound as big as it is, let me summarize. While Monsignor Leary was serving as secretary of education in Ogdensburg, catholic schools were undergoing a major change in their education model. For the first time, their entire curriculum would be one developed by Catholics - no longer relying on outside institutions and models - in order to instruct students according to Catholic values. And Father Leary had a major role in New York State and across the country in implementing this new model under this brand new paradigm.