Catholic schools are an important element of the educational environment in the United States and are often the subject of effectiveness studies. However, Catholic school leadership, for the most part, is left out of the research loop (Schuster, 2000). While the learner affects schooling outcomes, the leadership of the school principal is the critical component in determining school quality (Sergiovanni, 1997). Today's Catholic schools differ greatly from Catholic schools prior to Vatican II. School leaders are faced with greater responsibilities than their predecessors. For example, within the Los Angeles Archdiocese, Catholic school principals are challenged to strategize different ways to market their schools, increase their enrollment, and raise funds for schools to remain viable. Based on a literature review on Catholic school leadership, including (a) the history of Catholic schools in the United States, (b) Catholic school governance, (c) Catholic school leadership, (d) strategic planning, and (e) the changing role of the school principal in the future of Catholic education, the following three research questions serve as the premise of the study: . What do Catholic elementary school principals identify as skills needed to lead Catholic schools in the 21st century? . What are Catholic elementary school principals' perceptions of how their role is changing? . How do Catholic elementary school principals identify their role and the current struggles of implementing a centralized strategic plan in a large Catholic diocese? This study employs a mixed-methods research design including a document review of the Los Angeles Archdiocese Strategic Plan and a survey containing multiple choice, Likert-scale type questions, and open-ended qualitative items. This research study is conducted to identify Catholic school elementary principals' role in implementing the current Strategic Plan for the Los Angeles Archdiocese and struggles principals encounter in implementing the Strategic Plan at their school site. Further, this research investigates how the Catholic school principalship is changing and the necessary skills that Catholic elementary school principals need to practice for leading these schools in the 21st century. Recommendations are discussed for Catholic elementary school principal training needed to lead future Catholic schools. Catholic schools are an important element of the educational environment in the United States and are often the subject of effectiveness studies. However, Catholic school leadership, for the most part, is left out of the research loop (Schuster, 2000). While the learner affects schooling outcomes, the leadership of the school principal is the critical component in determining school quality (Sergiovanni, 1997). Today's Catholic schools differ greatly from Catholic schools prior to Vatican II. School leaders are faced with greater responsibilities than their predecessors. For example, within the Los Angeles Archdiocese, Catholic school principals are challenged to strategize different ways to market their schools, increase their enrollment, and raise funds for schools to remain viable. Based on a literature review on Catholic school leadership, including (a) the history of Catholic schools in the United States, (b) Catholic school governance, (c) Catholic school leadership, (d) strategic planning, and (e) the changing role of the school principal in the future of Catholic education, the following three research questions serve as the premise of the study: . What do Catholic elementary school principals identify as skills needed to lead Catholic schools in the 21st century? . What are Catholic elementary school principals' perceptions of how their role is changing? . How do Catholic elementary school principals identify their role and the current struggles of implementing a centralized strategic plan in a large Catholic diocese? This study employs a mixed-methods research design including a document review of the Los Angeles Archdiocese Strategic Plan and a survey containing multiple choice, Likert-scale type questions, and open-ended qualitative items. This research study is conducted to identify Catholic school elementary principals' role in implementing the current Strategic Plan for the Los Angeles Archdiocese and struggles principals encounter in implementing the Strategic Plan at their school site. Further, this research investigates how the Catholic school principalship is changing and the necessary skills that Catholic elementary school principals need to practice for leading these schools in the 21st century. Recommendations are discussed for Catholic elementary school principal training needed to lead future Catholic schools. Catholic schools are an important element of the educational environment in the United States and are often the subject of effectiveness studies. However, Catholic school leadership, for the most part, is left out of the research loop (Schuster, 2000). While the learner affects schooling outcomes, the leadership of the school principal is the critical component in determining school quality (Sergiovanni, 1997). Today's Catholic schools differ greatly from Catholic schools prior to Vatican II. School leaders are faced with greater responsibilities than their predecessors. For example, within the Los Angeles Archdiocese, Catholic school principals are challenged to strategize different ways to market their schools, increase their enrollment, and raise funds for schools to remain viable. Based on a literature review on Catholic school leadership, including (a) the history of Catholic schools in the United States, (b) Catholic school governance, (c) Catholic school leadership, (d) strategic planning, and (e) the changing role of the school principal in the future of Catholic education, the following three research questions serve as the premise of the study: . What do Catholic elementary school principals identify as skills needed to lead Catholic schools in the 21st century? . What are Catholic elementary school principals' perceptions of how their role is changing? . How do Catholic elementary school principals identify their role and the current struggles of implementing a centralized strategic plan in a large Catholic diocese? This study employs a mixed-methods research design including a document review of the Los Angeles Archdiocese Strategic Plan and a survey containing multiple choice, Likert-scale type questions, and open-ended qualitative items. This research study is conducted to identify Catholic school elementary principals' role in implementing the current Strategic Plan for the Los Angeles Archdiocese and struggles principals encounter in implementing the Strategic Plan at their school site. Further, this research investigates how the Catholic school principalship is changing and the necessary skills that Catholic elementary school principals need to practice for leading these schools in the 21st century. Recommendations are discussed for Catholic elementary school principal training needed to lead future Catholic schools.

Discrimination in the Indian Catholic Church is a leading reason why the lower caste Dalits leave and join the Pentecostal churches, especially in south India. This is a grave threat to the future of the Catholic faith in India and the sharing of the true and full Gospel message. In this paper, I will explore three themes in these regards: the current reasons for leaving, historical and social context, and theological teachings, and provide a recommended pastoral approach for the Church’s response to this crisis. Specifically, Reasons why the Pentecostal and Charismatic churches draw Christians away from the Catholic Church. Historical context and the social experiences of the Dalits. Theological foundations of the fundamental rights of human beings based on Jesus’ response to marginalized peoples. How the Catholic Church might respond in the current culture.

We need young people, because without them the Catholic Church will have no future. Increases in disaffiliation are seen in different races, genders, generations and countries. Using the Pew Research Center and Forum data, and Richard Osmer’s four tasks of practical theology, this paper will study first who are the disaffiliates, nones, and deconverts and then why they left the church. The Christian Church is based on a community of faith and worship, with evangelization at its heart. Christians need to participate, and evangelize to fully live as Christians. We will review several solutions on how to attract people back into church life. In becoming ‘cultural missionaries’ we can connect with modern culture, and use contemporary approaches to make the voice of the Lord accessible and comprehensible to all people. Unless we truly welcome modern culture, the young, divorced and transgendered into all parts of the Church, we are doomed to become just an anachronistic cultural curiosity.

The topic of Catholic school viability is the backdrop of this study, which examined issues associated with Catholic school sustainability and the possibilty for transformation. The focus was a case study of a single Catholic elementary school in a historically magrinalized community. The experiences and reflections of 10 heterogeneous members of the school community were examined in light of the school's attempt to transform and ultimately sustain itself. The study took a holistic look at the school's organizational processes in order to identify sustainability measures and characteristics. Methods included observation, interview, document review, and an application of the principles associated with appreciative inquiry, a tool used in organizational development and reform. The study's findings, viewed through the lens of chaos theory, are framed as tensions. Tensions here refer to the push/ pull elements in the shcool's struggle to find balance between new additions to the school program and what already exists (Pascale, Millemann, & Gioja, 2000). The findings are grouped as a primary tension, which is general in nature, and secondary tensions, which are specific to St. Leo School. The primary tension illustrates how a school undergoing change is marked by circumstance, unpredictability, co-creation, and resistance to environmental control. The secondary tensions detail the struggles over internal/external organizational control, Catholic school/market organizational principles, and staff and stakeholder retention/turnover. Additionally, it was found that the core characteristics of community, spirtuality, and justice act as binding elements that complement salary perks or tuition scholarships for teachers and students, respectively. Questions about the role of benefactors, school boards, and other external influences on the life of the school were also raised and examined. Overall, the findings supported the notion that Catholic schools in historically marginalized communities must seek innovative measures yet be able to adapt to a constantly shifting environmental landscape in order to survive.

A major problem with current discussions on the moral theory of St. Thomas Aquinas is the fact that many interpreters present Thomas's thought as a natural-law morality. While natural law is an element of Thomas's moral theory, it plays a subordinate role to the virtue of prudence. The natural law interpreters of St. Thomas's moral theory hold that (1) natural law is the dominant element, (2) natural law can be treated in isolation from Thomas's account of virtue, and (3) the principles of natural law make Thomas's moral theory abstract and deontological. These interpretations rarely consider the virtue of prudence. Natural law, in Thomas's moral theory, makes general statements about human nature and also sets the parameters for morally good human activity. However, it fails to function adequately on the level of an agent's particular moral problems. The general precepts of natural law do not function as proximate principles of human action. But the special function of moral virtue is to provide the agent with the necessary proximate principles of human action. Virtue is an acquired disposition of the soul that functions as a proximate principle of action. Holding a special place in Thomas's moral theory, prudence is primary among the moral virtues. It is defined as "right reason concerning things to be done." Prudence holds a middle place between he intellectual virtues and the moral virtues. It requires right thinking about moral matters, but it also requires the possession of a right appetite. This essay includes some discussion of human nature, as ethics is subordinated to psychology. Furthermore, we must show how the human agent engages in moral activity, and this requires discussing the psychological processes involved in human action. It is my purpose to explore the functions of natural law and virtue and to take account of the relationship between them in Thomas's moral theory. After establishing a proper understanding of Thomas's view, it will be clear that the natural-law interpreters have missed a crucial element in his ethical theory.

In this study it is not the author's aim to attempt to cover the field pertaining to the origin and development of the Eucharist. A vast number of competent works have been vrritten on the subject, but the primary purpose here is to examine the Eucharistic teachings of the Didache in the light of Canonical, early Christian, and non-Christian literature, in an effort to determine if the Didache presents the Eucharist (or Lord's Supper) in its original form as practiced in the primitive Christian Church of the first century. Further, we propose to show how the simplicity of the act was developed into a crystallized rite, or sacrament, by the time of the second century Church.

This thesis presents an inquiry into personality development, that is, it advances a theory of personality formation based on the symbiotic relationship between mother and child. It will show indications from the research of Rappoport, Ottinger and Simmons, and the writings of Mahler, that in the relationship between the infant and its mother, the infant at first thinks that the mother is an actual part of its own wholeness. Therefore, the theory will attempt to explain how a normal, a neurotic or a psychotic personality structure of later years can be traced back to the symbiotic phase of the infant's development. The symbiotic phase is considered by Mahler to terminate about thirty-six months after birth, but this theory will stress that the critical stage in personality development is reached somewhere before the first year of life is complete.

Religious counselors tend to neglect theorists who oppose religion. B. F. Skinner and Albert Ellis implicitly and explicitly criticize religion in their published writings. These criticisms are connected with their atheistic philosophies. Thomism is a theistic philosophy endorsed by the Catholic Church. Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan have integrated Thomism with contemporary thought. Their works serve as models for this research project--a counselor's integration of Thomism with the philosophies of B. F. Skinner and Albert Ellis. A counselor can disconnect Skinnerian and Ellisian criticisms of religion from their atheistic philosophies. Viewing the same criticisms in the context of a theistic theory, a counselor can gain insights on religion and related topics --sin, guilt, belief in God, prayer, afterlife--as they apply to counseling. This writer hopes that this project will be an example to other religious counselors who attempt to integrate religion and counseling.

The Sad Kitchen, a work of magical realism, tells the story of a saintly woman named Helen. She opens an underground kitchen where people who feel guilty can come to be comforted and nurtured in the middle of the night. The story is, at its heart, a reflection on forgiveness. Song of Neon, also of the magical realist genre, is an existential work about a nurse named Avery and her husband, an owl house maker, named Saul. Their town, Milliard, is under a trance. Avery and Saul struggle with their respective identities in the quiet, vacuum the town has become.

The role of a Catholic school principal is complex and includes promoting Catholic faith and spirituality throughout the school community. The additional job requirements of spiritual leadership are intentional formation for prospective and novice principals and efforts to sustain spirituality for experienced principals. This qualitative study explored the perceptions held by experienced lay elementary principals of their role as spiritual leader as well as how prepared they felt to serve in this role. Additionally, the study explored suggestions for sustaining principals in their role as spiritual leader. Participants were six lay Catholic elementary principals working in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. Data were collected in the form of written reflections, interviews, and a focus group. There were three rounds of written reflections and interviews. A focus group was conducted after the three rounds of data collection. Initial analysis was conducted by identifying emerging themes for each research question. The Four Pillars of Jesuit Leadership Framework was used to discuss the findings. Findings indicated the need for formation and training programs for lay Catholic elementary school principals specifically focused on their role as spiritual leader. Additionally, principals need more supports and opportunities to renew themselves to continue serving as spiritual leaders. These findings support the need for the archdiocese to take responsibility for training and forming lay principals as this responsibility is beyond the scope of the Department of Catholic Schools.