From the very start, the founders of The Heights understood education to consist in the communication of a culture. As culture often enters a boy's mind through his senses, an important means of this transmission is the art and architecture of a school. Indeed, in many ways buildings embody the ideals of an institution.
This week Joe Cardenas, head of mentoring and long-time art history teacher, joins us for a conversation on the importance of beauty in education. Rooting the conversation in the American tradition, Joe helps us see why and how the art and architecture of schools is as important as the books in its curriculum.
As we hear from Joe, the art on a school’s walls become the images adorning a student’s soul. If we want to help our boys be at home in their very selves, the art of schools is an indispensable means to this end.
Chapters
Additional Resources
Adoremus.org's explanation of the Four Seasonal Marian Anthems (includes history and translation)
PDF of Music and Lyrics to Alma Redemtoris Mater from gregorian-chant-hymns.com
Speech on the Rebuilding of the House of Commons by Winston Churchill
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
The Feeling of Things, the Contemplation of Beauty by Joseph Ratzinger
A Catholic Eton? by Paul Shrimpton
Also on the Forum
School Tone, the Most Powerful Teacher with Alvaro de Vicente
Building Little Houses: Why Random Art Projects Are Awesome by Joe Bissex
Manners: The Art of Happiness by Robert Greving
Why Our Politics Needs Poetry with Dr. Matthew Mehan
Five Fruits of a Poetic Education by Nate Gadiano
In many schools, education is understood in reductively intellectual terms. The point of teaching, it would seem, is merely to inform, to fill the mind with data, to train the intellect to perform tasks and solve puzzles. To be sure, information and intellectual virtues are essential aspects of education; but they are not the whole, and to make them so would be to reduce the person to his mind.
In this talk, taken from our recent Art of Teaching Conference, Anton Vorozhko helps us understand the role of the heart in the education of the whole human person. Starting with a reflection on the greatest of teachers, Christ—the one to whom all other teachers ought ultimately to point—Anton offers advice at once practical and personal. His talk centers on three areas, or apostolates, which he suggests teachers should consider: presence, correction, and prayer.
In the end, considering these three apostolates will help teachers turn their daily work into what St. John Henry Newman called a cor ad cor loquitur—a heart speaking unto heart—making his task not only to inform the mind but equally to move the heart.
Chapters
Additional Resources
Forty Dreams of St. John Bosco: From St. John Bosco’s Biographical Memoirs by St. John Bosco
Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II by George Weigel
Also on The Forum
The Art of Teaching: On Forming Contemplative Souls with Rich Moss
Developing Your Son’s Will with Andy Reed
The Freedom to Form Bonds: Kevin Majeres on Mindfulness and Attention with Dr. Kevin Majeres
The Talk and Beyond with Michael Moynihan
In this episode, we feature a recorded lecture given by Rich Moss in his introductory presentation at the Art of Teaching conference hosted by The Heights Forum last week. In this talk, Rich explains why teaching is an art, what that art is, and what are the tools utilized by the teaching artist.
Boys love concrete details and, even more, they love when those concrete details form the fabric of a hero's tale. Indeed, as Aristotle himself knew, better than telling adolescents merely about virtue is giving them examples of heroes, for good men are not made in theory, but in practice and boys need to see virtues practiced to be inspired themselves.
What better place to turn than an author who has taught generations of leaders, not least of which were our own country’s founders. That man is Plutarch and our guide is Tom Cox, one of the architects of the eighth grade core humanities class and current upper school classics teacher.
In this episode, Mr. Cox shows why and how we teach Plutarch to our boys. He explains why it is important to find the good even in heroes that are less than saints and helps us understand that education is more than something that merely happens; it requires a boy’s freedom.
Although heroes may not be saints, they are good starting points. It is perhaps not mere happenstance that Plutarch wrote his biographies as the Evangelists were writing their lives of life’s Author. As the Greek philosopher was a master at portraying those little details which form a hero’s character, it is the man from Nazareth who teaches us to turn them into heroic verse—and that is the beginning of holiness.
Chapters
Additional Resources
Lives by Plutarch
Also on The Forum
Writing and Thought; Oratory and Ethics: What we Give Our 7th Graders in the Core with Tom Cox
History the Way It Was… And the Way It Should Be by Mark Grannis
Aristotle on the Student’s Job by Tom Cox
Seneca on the Teacher’s Job by Tom Cox
This week on HeightsCast, we feature headmaster Alvaro de Vicente’s open house speech on the mission and vision of The Heights School. In the speech, Alvaro helps parents discern the right school for their son. Understanding education to be essentially about partnering with parents to transmit a culture, he encourages parents to thoughtfully consider the culture of our school and how it relates to the culture of their own homes. In addition, Mr. de Vicente offers a few words on our vision of manhood, suggesting that to be a good man, one must also be quite dangerous: powerful enough to do damage, but with the moral character to do great things.
Chapters
Additional Resources
Against All Hope: A Memoir of Life in Castro’s Gulag by Armando Valladares
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
Also on The Forum
The Man Fully Alive with Alvaro de Vicente
Self-Mastery: Alvaro de Vicente on Fostering Interior Freedom in Schools with Alvaro de Vicente
Who Am I?: The Question of Persona with Alvaro de Vicente
Our Little Protectors: How Do WE See Our Boys? with Alvaro de Vicente
Forming Wise, Courageous Risk-Takers with Alvaro de Vicente
This week on HeightsCast, we feature a recording of the 2022 Headmaster’s Lecture on the man fully alive. In this lecture, Mr. Alvaro de Vicente helps us understand what we mean when we use St. Irenaeus’ oft-quoted though seldom understood words that gloria Dei est vivens homo: the glory of God is living man.
Mr. de Vicente shares his thoughts on the destination and the road ahead, suggesting that to live fully on earth we must understand that the fullness of life is found only in heaven. And if we are to reach this destination which is our destiny, we should see this life as practice for the next.
In particular, he offers three actions that are the best practice for heaven:
Taking us through each of these, Mr. de Vicente helps us to approach life in a playful way, taking ourselves lightly and others seriously; to discover the beauty of the world, contemplating with loving eyes and a grateful heart; and to commit fully, passionately persevering in our love for others. Our boys will not live these ideals perfectly—we will not live them perfectly—but if together we begin and begin again often, we will be well on the way; and that will be a taste of heaven.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
Foundations of Hope: Raising Optimistic Men Fully Alive with Alvaro de Vicente
The Education of “Men Fully Alive”: The Mission and Vision of The Heights with Alvaro de Vicente
Who Am I?: The Question of Persona with Alvaro de Vicente
Our Little Protectors: How Do WE See Our Boys? with Alvaro de Vicente
Forming Wise, Courageous Risk-Takers with Alvaro de Vicente
In Defense of Victory by Kyle Blackmer
Additional Resources
Against Heresies by St. Irenaeus
In this week’s episode, we discuss science fiction with Mr. Joe Breslin, fifth grade teacher and soon-to-be published author of Other Minds: 13 Tales of Wonder and Sorrow. Surveying the wide umbrella of literature and film termed “sci-fi,” Mr. Breslin helps us understand what makes this genre of literature valuable, interesting, and beautiful.
As Mr. Breslin explains, science fiction done well offers a celebration of the human person, showing us in often strange ways what is possible for us as thinking beings. Moreover, by removing us from the humdrum of our ordinary lives and instilling a sense of awe as we experience another world, science fiction can provide new insights into old problems, helping us rediscover the wonder of our own everyday lives. And this is often much needed–for although our world may never be lacking in wonders, we may at times find our weary selves lacking in the wonder to see it.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
Modern Literature: On Curating the Contemporary with Michael Ortiz
Guiding Our Boys through Modern Literature with Joe Breslin and Lionel Yaceczko
Exploring and Expressing the Human Condition through Literature with Michael Ortiz
Additional Resources
Joey Breslin Writes, Mr. Breslin’s writing website
From the boys’ choir in the lower school to the men’s chorus in the upper school, informal performances at faculty dinners to songs at the annual Maryland Day Gala, singing echoes throughout the whole of The Heights experience. This week, we sit down with Mr. Patrick Love, music teacher at The Heights since 2004, to discuss not only when and where we sing at The Heights but why we love to sing so much.
As you’ll hear, singing—broadly understood—is at the heart of our school's mission. Cantare amantis est, St. Augustine tells us: singing belongs to the one who loves. And as Arthur Clutton-Brock wrote, “education ought to teach us how to be in love always and what to be in love with.” In educating our boys to become men fully alive, then, we are ultimately helping them to love, to find their voice, and to fall in love with One who sings them into existence.
This week on HeightsCast we talk with upper school head, Michael Moynihan, about a new initiative of his on the Forum: the Initiative for the Renewal of Science Education. In the episode, Michael discusses the need for a new synthesis in the liberal arts, combining the best of modern science with the wisdom of ages. In particular, he explains how the recent tendency in science education to begin with theory and then proceed to phenomena is unscientific, producing students with a habit of intellectual surrender, rather than the inspiration to become great scientists.
In this week’s episode, we talk with headmaster Alavaro de Vicente about a central theme from our faculty workshop: self-mastery. As Alvaro explains, self-mastery is a certain integration of action, words, thoughts, and desires that gives one the interior freedom to not only do the good but to want to do the good.
What does this self-mastery look like for teachers, for students, and for parents? How do we help our boys develop self-mastery? What is the role of a school in assisting parents with this great endeavor?
As man is not made virtuous in a day, Mr. de Vicente encourages us to think long term. At the same, he reminds us to focus on the little things, those small, daily realities where aspiration becomes actuality. In particular, he suggests dress code, punctuality, and language as three battlefields on which we can wage war alongside our sons—not against them—as they grow in interior freedom.
Self-mastery, Alvaro explains, is not about mastering the world or others. It is rather about mastery of oneself so as to be able to steward the little piece of creation which the Creator has given us. For some, this may be a team. For others, it could be a whole company or even a country. For most, this will be a family, for whom the father has a special kind of care—a care which is best lived out when he recognizes that he is both a father and the Father’s son.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
Respectful Dominion: Colin Gleason on Discipline with Colin Gleason
Learn to Turn: Tom Royals on Parental Prudence with Tom Royals
Manners: The Art of Happiness by Robert Greving
Why My Computer Science Students Should Master the Guitar by George Martin
Training the Hand to Train the Mind by Robert Greving
Additional Resources
A Catholic Eton? Newman’s Oratory School by Paul Shrimpton
Against All Hope: A Memoir of Life in Castro’s Gulag by Armando Valladares
In this week's episode we discuss fights. Most boys, especially at a young age, have a beautiful need for rough and tumble physical play. But what happens when it's not play? What happens when egos are insulted and the fists go up? Or when there's an unjust aggression? At what point is a young lad–or an older one–justified in puttin' up his dukes? Teacher and Coach, Kyle Blackmer, gives us some points for consideration as we coach our sons on the use of physical force. In the end, this is another one of those areas where parents–most often, but not always, dad–are the primary educators of boys learning the proper employment of one of God's great gifts: their strength.
In many quarters of contemporary society, busy-ness has become a sort of cliche greeting. To the question “How are you?”, the response, “So busy,” is often automatic. To borrow the words of Dr. R.J. Snell, many of us are conspicuously busy; and we wear our busy-ness as a sort of badge of honor, rooting our worth in our work.
In last week’s episode, we talked with Dr. Snell about work and acedia. This week, we round out that episode with a discussion of what is ultimately the point of work, namely leisure. While we may often think of leisure as ordered toward work—we rest so that we may work more—Dr. Snell explains how the reverse is nearer the truth, not only etymologically but also metaphysically. Work is for the sake of leisure, as instrumental goods are for the sake of intrinsic goods.
As you’ll hear, if we take the Eucharistic feast seriously on Sunday, then the rest of our days will be caught up into that Eucharastic feast. Monday will be different, for though we may be just as busy as before, our activity will no longer be so frenetic. It may even take on the mysterious rhythm of a divine dance.
Also on The Forum
Additional Resources
A certain distinguished school leader, when asked when he would retire from his work, replied, “the day that I wake up and do not want to go to work.” A reply such as this perhaps strikes the modern ear as senseless. For many of us, work fills the greater portion of our daily lives, but do we feel ourselves thereby fulfilled? Especially today, we may often feel trapped in what seem like unspectacular sisyphean cycles.
This week, R. J. Snell, editor-in-chief of Public Discourse and director of the Center on the University and Intellectual Life at the Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, New Jersey, talks to HeightsCast about the virtues of work and its opposing vice, acedia. Drawing on insights from his book, Acedia and Its Discontents, R. J. helps us think through how these concepts are realized in the context of family life and life on campus.
As we will hear, our everyday work is the ordinary means by which we participate not only in the perfection of God’s creation but also in the perfection of our very selves. Our work is where the rubber meets the road; it is where mere aspiration is turned into actual reality. Ultimately, work is where heaven and earth merge. In realizing this often hidden truth, we may thereby discover that divine drama which is not a sisyphean cycle, but a spiral staircase.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
Additional Resources
This episode features Mr. Michael Moynihan's lecture at last year's Teaching Vocation Conference. Our Upper School Head shares why a liberal arts education is needed more today than in times past. And the reasons are not simply that classics majors can code too. To the contrary, an authentic liberal education gives us not only truth, but also a ground upon which to stand. Many of our current social crises are rooted precisely in such a poverty: we mistrust much of our ability to know, and consequently we don't know much of what gives life purpose and meaning.
Michael goes on to share four characteristics of a good liberal arts education. According to our Upper School Head, such an education:
More on the Forum:
In last week’s episode, we considered how beauty is a special combination of order and surprise. To behold beauty, we learned, is to contemplate the dynamism of a being on the way to its perfection. It is to see the rose emerging from its seed.
This week we talk with assistant headmaster, Tom Royals, about learning to see the beauty—albeit often messy beauty—of our own growing children. To be sure, in this adventure, we may find more surprise than order. Nevertheless, in learning to see our children with loving eyes, we learn to better understand them. And in better understanding them, we are better able to accompany them along their paths, each of which has its own peculiar order.
In this episode, Tom encourages us to avoid thinking of our children as projects and instead to learn to contemplate them as free persons. For it is only in becoming contemplatives of our children that they will know themselves to be understood and loved, as they are. This knowledge, more than anything, will become the basis of their growth. Like Chesterton said of Rome, they are not loved because they were first great; they will become great because they have first been loved.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
20 Ways to Improve the Family Dinner by Rich Moss
Against Indifference by Tom Longano
Ways to Foster a Family Culture by Alvaro de Vicente
On Home as Social Hub: The Importance of Hosting Our Sons and Their Friends with Tom Royals
Learn to Turn: Tom Royals on Parental Prudence with Tom Royals
Cultivating Friendship in the Classroom by Austin Hatch
Our Little Protectors: How Do WE See Our Boys? with Alvaro de Vicente
It sounds nice to say, using Dostoevsky's words, that beauty will save the world. But is this claim true? If so, in what sense is it true? What even is beauty? And what would it mean for it to save the world?
This week, we welcome Dr. Lionel Yaceczko back to HeightsCast to discuss beauty: what it is and what the Western tradition can tell us about it. Today’s episode is rooted in a previous discussion we had with Dr. Yaceczko, in which he spoke with us about Western civilization. In that episode, we considered what Western civilization is and why it is still worth studying today. This week, we look at one reason why the study of the West is a fruitful endeavor: it can help us better appreciate beauty.
As we hear from Dr. Yaceczko, beauty consists in the marriage of order and surprise. It is the fruit of keeping the commandments and breaking the conventions. As such, seeing part of a beautiful work of art first invites our prediction—there is order and we can discern it—and then astounds our expectation—but that order is not mere slavish repetition.
Whenever we find beauty in this world, we glimpse eternity. Each glimpse spurs us on to find the fullness of that beauty, which is our perfection and which will surpass all predictions: eye has not seen, nor ear heard what has been prepared for those who truly love. And when, God-willing, we find that Beauty—or perhaps, better yet, when He finds us— we will finally be at home. And yet, if our intuition about beauty here is on track, then we will forever be astonished with Whom we find.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
A Study for All Seasons: Lionel Yaceczko on the Western Tradition with Dr. Lionel Yaceczko
What Is the Difference between Free Time and Leisure? by Joe Bissex
Five Fruits of a Poetic Education by Nate Gadiano
The Way of Encounter by Joe Breslin
Matter and Form, Substance and Accidents by Michael Moynihan
Additional Resources
The Making of Europe: An Introduction to the History of European Unity by Christopher Dawson
Beauty: What It Is and Why It Matters by John-Mark L. Miravalle
The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Manalive by G. K. Chesterton
In this week’s episode, we continue our conversation with Dr. Kevin Majeres, turning our attention to the importance of setting challenges and the way actions shape emotions. Drawing on these two topics, Dr. Majeres helps us think through how parents can best help a son that is struggling with an addiction of any sort.
In particular, Dr. Majeres responds to the following questions:
As we hear from Dr. Majeres, true freedom consists in the ability to form a deep bond and faithfully maintain it over time. Rather than a mere negation—a freedom from some outside force—the deepest freedom lies in a freedom for, the ability to give of oneself to another. We might well say, then, that there is no greater freedom than the freedom of friendship, and that the greatest of friends is He who leads us in libertatem gloriae filiorum Dei: into the glorious freedom of the sons of God.
The Master and His Emissary by Iain McGilchrist
Growing Up Brave by Donna Pincus
OptimalWork on YouTube
On Freedom and Phones with Alvaro de Vicente
Why Boys Need to Be Given Freedom by Andrew Reed
Freedom in the Upper School by Rich Moss
We have all experienced moments in which we are so immersed in a task that we lose track of time and performance feels effortless. For some, this may occur on the sports field; for others, in the classroom; and still, for others, in the performance hall.
Yet, we have likely also experienced the opposite. For many children, the struggle for concentration is probably more prevalent.
Last week, we began a three-part series with Dr. Kevin Majeres. We discussed what anxiety is and how parents can help their sons—and themselves—turn occasions of anxiety into opportunities for growth. This week, we are back with Dr. Majeres to discuss attention and mindfulness.
In the episode, Dr. Majeres helps us begin to answer the following questions:
In the end, mindfulness offers us a doorway into two aspects of freedom that are at the heart of human flourishing. Learning to attend to our work at school helps us to attend to others in society. And, in both instances, learning to attend well is a pathway to love; for what we love captures our attention — what lover does not often find his mind turning to his beloved? — and that to which we attend, we can begin to love.
If education is the turning of a mind, as we hear in the Republic, then mindfulness may well be fundamental to its success. For when one turns toward the truth, he will thereby be ready not only to recognize it but, even more, he will be prepared to fall in love with it.
Chapters
Additional Resources
What is a Golden Hour? with Dr. Kevin Majeres and Sharif Younes
Back to the Basics: An Intro to OptimalWork with Dr. Kevin Majeres
OptimalWork on YouTube
Reflections on the Right Use of School Studies by Simone Weil
Also on The Forum
From Anxiety to Adventure with Dr. Kevin Majeres
Why We Need Exposure to Nature by Eric Heil
Training the Hand to Train the Mind by Robert Grieving
Three Guiding Principles for Homework by Rich Moss
Adorning our school’s main hallway is a sort of charter for the Heights graduate which designates him as a man who is “optimistic toward life’s challenges,” as one who “sees freedom as an opportunity to choose the good.” Fostering these ideals in each student is a central aspect of the school’s mission. But, in a world that is increasingly filled with children suffering from anxiety, how—in very practical terms—can we help our students develop such an outlook on life?
Last month, we heard from Mr. Alex Berthé on how parents can find peace in an anxiety ridden world. This week on HeightsCast, we begin a series of discussions with Dr. Kevin Majeres, lecturer at Harvard Medical School and Founder of OptimalWork.
In this three-part series, we take a deep dive into three sets of challenges which are becoming increasingly prevalent in today’s youth, and three mindsets or skills that can help us as parents and teachers to help our boys help themselves:
Our first discussion with Dr. Majeres focuses on anxiety. Combining years of experience as a psychiatrist and drawing on research in cognitive behavioral therapy, Dr. Majeres teaches us both what anxiety is and what we can do about it.
In the episode, we learn:
An essential component of The Heights School’s mission is to help students discover the adventure hidden in every challenge they face. Having spoken with Dr. Majeres, we might phrase this skill as the ability to turn the adrenaline of anxiety into the adventure of everyday life.
Chapters
Additional Resources
The Golden Hour with Dr. Kevin Majeres
Turning the Knots in Your Stomach into Bows by Jeremy Jamieson, et al.
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck
Also on The Forum
“Learn to Turn”: Tom Royals on Parental Prudence
Parenting: Patience or Optimism with Andrew Reed
The Stressed Son: The Causes of Adolescent Anxiety with Alvaro de Vicente
Be the Rock: Fatherhood During Times of Crisis by Kyle Blackmer
Toughness for the Adolescent Boy by Kyle Blackmer
In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul tells us that he has “become all things to all people,” so that he might better share the blessings of the Good News with more people. To become such a man who can be for all seasons, however, one must have been educated for all seasons. A preparation of this sort is precisely what the Liberal Arts, rooted in the Western Tradition, afford those who wish to pursue them. In Cicero’s own words, these arts are apt for both all seasons and all settings:
Though, even if there were no such great advantage to be reaped from [the study of literature], and if it were only pleasure that is sought from these studies, still I imagine you would consider it a most reasonable and liberal employment of the mind: for other occupations are not suited to every time, nor to every age or place; but these studies are the food of youth, the delight of old age; the ornament of prosperity, the refuge and comfort of adversity; a delight at home, and no hindrance abroad; they are companions by night, and in travel, and in the country. (Pro archia poeta, 7.16)
Today we talk to Dr. Lionel Yaceczko about all things Western: Western Civilization, the Western Tradition, Western Culture. We discuss just what we mean by “the West," and why it has become so controversial in recent years. With Dr. Yaceczko’s guidance, we consider why a deep study of The West is still worth protecting and promoting, beyond nostalgia and mere academic interest.
In this week’s episode, Dr. Yaceczko sets the stage by offering a high level definition of these concepts, and then arguing that there is, indeed, something worth protecting in our tradition. This is especially true if we are interested in critiquing events of our own time and of times past, because the Western tradition is the source of so many of the commonly accepted standards now used to evaluate human conduct. Important concepts such as equality under law and justice for all are born of this culture, extending roots into both Rome and Christianity, and growing in the rich soil of both Roman and non-Roman peoples alike.
We might disagree about what they mean or how we use them, but perhaps that's a good place for us to start. And, if so, let's start at the very beginning: there was Rome, the Church, the Romans, and the Gentes.
Chapters
Suggested Reading
The Making of Europe: An Introduction to the History of European Unity by Christopher Dawson
Pro Archia Poeta by Marcus Tullius Cicero
Also on The Forum
On Christianity and the Classical Education with Dr. Lionel Yaceczko
History the Way it Was by Bill Dardis
Defining the Liberal Arts with Dr. Matthew Mehan
Is The Heights a Classical School? with Michael Moynihan
In the opening paragraph of his Confessions, St. Augustine writes, “our hearts are restless until they rest in You.” For many, the first half of this famous line is a well-known feeling; it is, in many ways, “the feeling of actual life,” to put it in Hemingway’s own terms. Indeed, there lives deep down a desire in all of our hearts for some mysterious reality — a green light across the bay — which seems to forever escape our grasp. Many are dreamers; fewer have found an object worthy of the greatness of their yearning.
What do we do about a situation such as this? And what, if anything, can modern literature do to help us?
This week, we sit down with Mike Ortiz to discuss one of the Upper School’s new courses in the English Department. The course we discuss considers two men who, though both great American authors of the first half of the twentieth century, differed greatly in both their lifestyles and their styles of writing. The authors are the effervescent and romantic F. Scott Fitzgerald and the macho, realist Ernest Hemingway.
For all their differences, however, both men shared at least one trait: a taste for the tragedies of life. Although their styles may diverge syntactically and verbally, the substance of what they express hits the reader with an equally direct force.
In this episode, Mike helps us approach some of the darker aspects of these two men’s lives and literature, seeing their works in the broader context of their lives and their lives in the broader context of our liberal arts curriculum at The Heights.
It’s difficult, Mike’s interlocutor reminds us, to be truly a man fully alive and not feel much pain, for to have lived fully is to have loved with a full heart; and, on this side of paradise, to have loved means to have suffered much. But, as we hear in the episode, reading and studying great authors such as these and, what is more, learning to see the tragic characters of their works in a broad context may be more than a little help in preparing our students to face the many tragic romances of a dreamer and encounter the realism of true Romance.
Chapters
Further Reading
Today is Friday by Ernest Hemingway
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
My Lost City by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Hemingway’s Brain by Andrew Farah
On Stories by C.S. Lewis
The Troubled Catholicism of Ernest Hemingway by Robert Inchausti
Also on The Forum
Hemingway’s Good Friday by Mike Ortiz
Modern Literature: On Curating the Contemporary with Mike Ortiz
Exploring and Expressing the Human Condition through Literature with Mike Ortiz
Growing up is, at least in part, a process of learning to ask, and learning to answer, certain fundamental questions. These include timeless queries such as “Who am I?” and “Why am I here?” Our sons, in particular, might ask themselves, “What does it mean to be a man?” and “What is the point of my life right now, given that I’m not a man yet?”
Our boys’ attempts to answer these questions, along with the answers those efforts yield, will lead them to a certain self-awareness—an identity of sorts. Ultimately, we want our boys to know themselves as they are: beloved sons of a Creator God who loves them deeply as a Father. Their lives, then, become an adventure of deepening in that awareness and of living accordingly. The earlier our lads can start down this path, the better.
In this episode, our headmaster explores:
As the great sage, Yogi Berra, reminds us: you've got to be very careful if you don't know where you are going, because you might not get there. This advice is true enough, but we can add that if you don’t get going, you never will. So, let us not be paralyzed by perfection. As we help our sons sail out of port, we can trust that with the help of good friends, good teachers, and the Good God Himself, it won’t be too long before he finds himself—and, even better, gives that self away out of love for the other.
Chapters
Also on The Forum
Mr. Alvaro de Vicente on Moral Imagination: Part I
Mr. Alvaro de Vicente on Moral Imagination: Part II
The Issue of Identity: Who does your son think he is? By Mr. Rich Moss
As parents, we cannot help but yearn for our child's success. Obviously this is rooted in a beautiful and healthy love. But sometimes that love can give way to fear, and that fear leads to anxieties that are unhealthy, not only for us, but for our children as well. What can we do about this? How can we care deeply about our children, without worrying so much that our worrying actually begins to weigh on the little guys we’re worrying about?
This week, we bring to you a recent Heights Lecture given by Mr. Alex Berthé, Licensed Clinical Social Worker and former Heights teacher/mentor. Blending clinical expertise with his own personal experiences, Alex helps us unpack the forces—rooted in love, though often expressed in fear—that are feeding our anxieties. In particular, Alex offers reflections on four key areas:
Anchored in hope and optimism, Alex shares how we, as parents subject to these powerful yet often subconscious forces, can reinforce our boys' confidence in their identity as children of God through rediscovery of our own.
As we hear, wisdom in parenting often consists in learning what things to ignore. If wisdom begins in wonder, as we hear from Socrates, then perhaps our worries will end when we learn to view our children—even at their lowest points—with the wonder with which our heavenly Father views us.
Highlights
Further Reading
Compass: A Handbook on Parent Leadership by James B. Stenson
Also on The Forum
Toughness for the Adolescent Boy by Mr. Kyle Blackmer
In this episode, we speak with Michael about:
As we hear from Michael in the episode, it is not enough to present God’s plan for human love as a series of negative rules. What is needed, rather, is to form men and women who are prepared to embrace the positive adventure that love entails. We need to help our children be daring so that, when they are sent into the world, they will be prepared to live out that crusade of manliness which our world needs, and to undo the savage work of those who see man as merely a beast.
“To be happy,” wrote St. Josemaria, “what you need is not an easy life but a heart which is in love.” And, we might add, to have a heart in love is not the work of a single moment, but the task of a whole life. Indeed, this is the task of each day: to grow ever deeper in love.
Show Highlights
Further Reading
Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier
Decisive Parenting by Michael Moynihan
The Father and His Family by Michael Moynihan
On this week’s episode, we discuss technology with Mr. John Beatty, IT director at The Heights School. While in past episodes we have spoken about smartphones, social media, and other forms of digital technology, in this episode we turn our attention particularly to the use of the internet on desktop computers.
As always, our aim is not merely to put up walls and make rules, but rather to help our sons grow in freedom. Our sons are not machines to be programmed, but rather humans to be formed; and this means that their intellect and will must be engaged. In the end, we want to graduate men who are prepared to embrace all that is good in the modern world, and so it is important that they be capable of using technology well.
To this end, Mr. Beatty offers advice that is not only technical, but also human:
Also on The Forum
Virtuous Use of Technology with Mr. Joe Cardenas
Digital Minimalism with Cal Newport
Computers and Technology in Education at The Heights by Michael Moynihan
When is Your Son Ready for a Smartphone with Mr. de Vicente
When is He Ready for a Smartphone with Mr. Alex Berthe