The Northern Catholic Church – Saint Stephen Region’s message at the beginning of the 2026/2027 school year
“Teach us to number our days that we may gain a wise heart!”
(Psalm 90:12)
At the beginning of the new school year, we lovingly turn to children and young people, parents, teachers, catechists, and all those who bear responsibility for the education of the next generation.
September brings a new beginning. School corridors fill up again, books and notebooks come out, the bell rings once more, and thousands of children, young people, and teachers set out on another shared journey. This period is full of hope and plans, but also uncertainty, fatigue, and sometimes fear.
As a church, we want to remind that school is not just a place to acquire knowledge. Education always means more than that. School is an important workshop of becoming human, where we not only gain knowledge but also learn to pay attention to each other, work together, take responsibility, accept failure, rejoice in others’ success, and start over.
In our time, we have almost unlimited access to information. The internet and artificial intelligence provide answers, write texts, calculate, translate, and offer solutions. All this carries many opportunities but cannot replace human conscience and wisdom. No technology can decide for us what is good, how to love, when to forgive, how to get up after failure, or what gives true meaning to our lives.
For this, not only knowledge is needed but wisdom.
Therefore, Christian education can never be satisfied with merely shaping successful people. We need young people who are honest, compassionate, responsible, able to serve others, and notice those in need of help.
In this, the role of the family is irreplaceable. A child needs appropriate conditions, school supplies, and opportunities, but above all love, attention, and presence. It is important that they know: their value is not in their report card. They are not lovable because they got a good grade, won a competition, or met others’ expectations. God’s love is not performance-based, and human love cannot be either.
We also think gratefully of teachers. Their vocation is much more than imparting knowledge. After years, we forget much of the curriculum, but we often remember for a lifetime the teacher who believed in us, who was patient, who did not humiliate us for failure, and who saw in us what we ourselves had not yet seen.
In education, not only the spoken word matters. We are educated by example, patience, justice, mercy, and how the stronger treats the weaker.
To students, we want to give this as a takeaway: a bad grade does not determine someone’s worth. A failure does not decide what they are capable of. Others’ opinions do not define who they are.
It is especially important to say this today when many young people seek their value in likes, followers, comments, or by comparing themselves to others’ successes. However, a person is much more than what a screen shows about them. More than a result, a photo, an opinion, or a report card.
The Christian faith teaches that our life is not accidental. God knows us, loves us, and calls each of us by name. Every human life is valuable, a gift, and a task. Therefore, faith does not take away freedom but gives direction and roots. Those who know they belong to God can face the unknown more bravely.
Therefore, at the beginning of the new school year, let us not only wish our children good grades and success. Let us wish them good friends, wise and humane teachers, curiosity, perseverance, joy, and courage.
Above all, let us wish them the courage to remain good.
Let them notice those who are left alone. Let them not laugh at those who find something harder. Let them dare to stand by those whom others exclude. Let them know that a kind word, a smile, a helping hand, or simply a place offered beside us can sometimes mean more than we think.
Let the 2026/2027 school year be not only a time for increasing knowledge but also for growth in faith, humanity, and the wisdom of the heart.
Let us give our children roots so they know who they are and to whom they belong – and let us give them wings to bravely set out on the path to which God calls them.
While we do everything for them, let us also entrust them to the One who stays with them even when we can no longer be by their side.
May God’s blessing accompany the children and young people, their families, teachers, catechists, and all those who lovingly and responsibly serve their education in the 2026/2027 school year.
