Chesterton Senior Maureen Barrett's 2021 Testimonial
“Searching for Truth and Other Things”
Maureen Barrett (2021) presented her testimonial at Chesterton’s 2021 Rose of Tepeyac Gala
The summer after junior year, most teens start college applications; I decided to apply to high school again. Before Chesterton Academy, I attended a secular private school from 6th grade to junior year. The first three years or so, I didn’t care about my faith. The only Catholic people I personally knew were my family, and they did not fit my middle school idea of cool by any means. Catholicism just felt like one more thing my parents wanted me to do.
Thankfully, during my freshman year, I found a few Catholic friends and decided I genuinely wanted to be Catholic. Over the next few years, I slowly began to realize that my faith should permeate every aspect of my life, and nothing could have shown me that more than the parish I found at the start of my junior year. I met a lot of kids who were actively living the faith, and it was really inspiring to me. They taught me what it means to be a Catholic student and I began to notice a lot of issues at my old school. My friends from school and I were drifting in opposite directions in life. As I rejected the culture of the world today, they embraced it more and more. At school, we were taught skills, not knowledge. We no longer read literature for its contents but to improve our reading skills. In class, I was being asked all of these big questions about life, but my school didn’t care what my answers were so long as they were well stated. I knew that I should be searching for the truth, but I had never really been taught how. I was working off a couple things I had read here and there and some Catholic podcasts. I was trying my best, but I knew there was a better way. When the college counselors at my old school asked me what kind of college I was looking to attend, I immediately told them that I want to go to a Catholic school and preferably a classical one.
Shortly thereafter, everything shut down due to the coronavirus. I didn’t see any of my friends from school, and I went to adoration every day. I liked the person I had become much better than the person I was when we were still in school. I grew restless and uncomfortable with the idea of returning to my old school the following year. I spent a lot of time asking God for an alternative should that be His will. Around that time, many of my friends from my new parish were getting accepted to Chesterton Academy of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and my mom just kept talking about how it was the school she dreamed about for my siblings and me. Too bad they were only accepting 9th through 11th graders this year. All I could do was stand there and listen to my friends guess how much work they were going to get that year. Then one day, one of my friends told me he thought Chesterton had one senior lined up to attend when the school opened. I came home that day and talked about it with my parents. We figured we would send a message through the school’s website to get a feel for the situation and see what happens. About an hour later, my dad was on the phone with Mr. Ohotnicky! Chesterton Academy did not have any seniors. Frankly, they weren’t really expecting any—I mean, who transfers their senior year? Mr. Ohotnicky was open to the idea, but we only had a week before I had to tell my old school I was leaving so we had to work fast.
The beginning of the week was a mad scramble to get everything together, but the second half was much worse; I just had to wait on the board’s decision. You’ll never guess what they said. Before long, I developed a whole spiel just to answer the question, “where do you go to school?” “Well—I uh—I actually just transferred—even though it’s my senior year—to Chesterton Academy of Our Lady of Guadalupe which just opened this year and I’m actually the only senior.” I always get some funny looks after that. It’s an odd position, the school’s only senior, but I am very grateful for it because I really enjoy Chesterton Academy. It’s a school that truly understands what Catholic education is supposed to be. The academics are challenging but rewarding. Every school on the planet will teach its students about the world, but Chesterton Academy is one of the few schools that also teaches about its Creator, and I am not simply referring to the fact that we have Theology class; a Chesterton education is truly centered around Christ no matter what class you’re in. In astronomy class, we often talk about the order with which God made the world; we live in a comprehensible world because God wants us to comprehend it. I know that might sound obvious, but I had never fully taken the time to contemplate it before Chesterton. Whenever we come across a good example of order and harmony in the world during class, Mr. Ohotnicky always gets super excited. I’ve never seen someone so enthusiastic about the math of Kepler’s third law of planetary motion or how similar the Law of Cosines is to this one equation for the variance of a combined random variable. I have always enjoyed seeing those kinds of connections, but I didn’t realize how special they were until I came to Chesterton. It’s those types of connections that point directly to the Creator. I just think that’s so cool, and it’s these types of things that have helped me regain my sense of wonder and awe about God’s creation that should be inherent in every Catholic student—every Catholic for that matter.
This newfound appreciation for the world around me has kept me motivated even when the search for truth can get particularly difficult. Our teachers often push my classmates and me to figure out things for ourselves instead of simply being spoon-fed answers. It can get a little messy and has led to a few accidental heresies on our part, but it’s easy to tell how much we’ve all grown because of it. It’s crazy to think that most of my classmates and I came into this school not knowing the importance of defining our terms—just think about how far we’ve come. The academic challenges all for the glory of God have made me genuinely eager to come to school every day.
However, it would not be fair to attribute my enjoyment of school solely to my new approach to academics; a large part of this enjoyment is due to the Chesterton Academy of Our Lady of Guadalupe community. The people at school are not simply the people I sit next to in statistics (or I guess the person I sit next to in statistics considering there are only two of us); they’re people that inspire me. I want to be around people who push me to become a better person, and that’s exactly what the Chesterton community does. It is full of some really smart, hard-working, and virtuous people. I don’t know of any other schools where students will skip lunch to go pray in church. Because there are so few of us, we have been able to become quite a bit closer than most school communities, which is a lot of fun. From house activities (Go Chrysostom!) to lyceum to special activities like the girls’ volleyball event and Christmas caroling, the Chesterton community genuinely enjoys spending time together.
These types of activities have led me to become a much more well-rounded person. Before I came to Chesterton Academy, I knew what I was good at, and I stuck to it. I was afraid to try new things, but now, thanks to the supportive community, I’ll try just about anything. I mean—I’m on the basketball team; I’ve never played basketball before in my life. Let’s just say I’ve truly embraced the Chestertonian idea that anything worth doing is worth doing badly. Looking back, it feels like everything that has ever happened in my life was so that God could to lead to this exact moment. I feel at peace even if there’s actually a lot of crazy stuff going on.
Although I am not quite sure what the future holds for me, I don’t think anywhere could prepare me better than Chesterton Academy. It seems absurd to think that I could have ever expected to leave high school without a Chesterton education even if I only get a year of it. I couldn’t be more grateful for this school, and although I will be sad to see it go, I am very happy to be the school’s first graduate.
