Combermere, a village along the Madawaska river (some two hours west of Ottawa) and home of the Madonna House, lay apostolate, is fast becoming a centre of Catholic Renaissance. A substantial number of Catholic home-schooling families have been moving into the Upper Ottawa Valley over the last few years, and this influx is gradually increasing. The village parish, Holy Canadian Martyrs, is a vibrant, faith-filled one, and very young with more children than are seen in most parishes (thanks to a general faithfulness to Humanae Vitae).

Through the hard work of two young mothers, our little parish has continuous adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. Adoration forms a spiritual wellspring for our community, the graces flowing out and watering the hidden but fertile seeds Divine Providence has planted, seeds of a little Catholic culture, seeds of hope amidst the desolation of the Church in Canada.

A remarkable array of people has taken up their abode in the hills of the Upper Ottawa valley. Scholars, authors, artists, farmers and tradesmen, the salt of earth, the simple faithful, all seeking a place to raise their families in the Faith, distanced from the corrosive effects of our decaying secular culture.

In a sense, this hamlet on the Madawaska River and a few other communities in the area, are rediscovering the tradition of the Mediaeval village which grew up in the protective shadow of the great Monasteries of Europe. Just as at end of the period of confusion caused by the collapse of the Roman empire, when the monastery provided stability, so today men seek a tangible cultural instantiation of the Faith. The true Christian community is a crucible from which wells up both intellectual and artistic achievement, truth and beauty, a foundation upon which can be built a new evangelization.

The renewal of Catholic Culture is never an arbitrary thing. Rather, it flows from the mysterious action of God in the souls of men, from hidden choices in the depths of conscience which draw them either into closer union with the indwelling Trinity, or into the confusion of the world. If a renewal of Catholic Culture is ever to take place, it will do so only as souls unite themselves more and more to the Sacrifice of the Cross, made mystically present each day at Mass, and then the faithful will carry this transformative grace into daily life.

Almost a year ago, two homeschooling mothers began to consider where to send their college age young people. There was no faithful Catholic College in Canada, and it had become just too expensive to send young people to the private colleges in the United States. They realized that their situation wasn't unique, and began to pray and fast, to offer up their Mass and Rosary, seeking an answer. Six months later, a group met and began to discuss the dilemma. The group included the young mothers, a retired priest who had for years taught theology at the Toronto School of Theology, a best-selling Catholic novelist, a young graduate student, and several others. It was decided to attempt the impossible and try to establish a College. While we realized the task was humanly impossible, there was a tremendous sense that God had called each one of us to this project.

We recognized the pressing problem to which our College would provide an answer. That there is no genuine Catholic College I knew from personal experience, for I had attended two Catholic Colleges in Canada. Both were affiliated with major secular universities. Both spent a remarkable amount of time trying to determine what it was that made them unique, what it was to be a Catholic university. Both were Catholic in name only.

Many friends of mine entered first year with me confidently expecting to deepen their understanding of the Faith, wanting to learn the truth both natural and supernatural. They left four years later, their Faith in tatters, their minds completely attuned to the prevailing skepticism. This situation was the norm in Canada's Catholic Colleges, I discovered, through my work with the Canadian Youth Pro-Life Organization.

In 1967, an important conference took place at Notre Dame's retreat centre. Known as the Land O'Lakes conference, it involved the presidents of the major Catholic universities in North America. The attendees determined that the Catholic universities must emulate the secular schools, so as to attract government money and private endowments. It was decided that to be uniquely Catholic was to be de-emphasized, and teachers were no longer to be hired or fired based upon doctrinal orthodoxy. The principles of this accord were to influence all of the major Catholic colleges on the continent. The beginning of the end of Catholic colleges took place in 1967. Things have digressed a long way since then.

The colleges form our future teachers, thus the effect of what is taught or not taught flows very quickly into our grade schools and high schools. Our young people are unaware of the most basic truths of the Faith.

One can speak of this crisis, this rupture in the Tradition of Catholic education, as resulting in a loss of memory. Perhaps the loss of historical memory of the Catholic doctrinal, spiritual and intellectual Tradition is even a greater crisis than the prevailing heretical teachings, the vigorous propagation of anti-truth that has become so common in our schools.

Given the sad state of Catholic education at all levels, are we to wonder at the fact that our young people leave the Church in droves? So much Catholic education teaches a secular version of the Faith, seasoned lightly with religious trappings.

No doubt the prevailing educational environment is poisoned by skepticism and relativism, but can we really blame the teachers for serving up what they were taught in college? If a change is to be made, we must get to the root cause. What we need is an orthodox centre of formation for college-aged young people.

Given the fact that, in spite of the cost, well over one hundred Canadian Catholics go deeply into debt to study at the good Catholic colleges in the United States each year. Given the influx of home schooling families into the Combermere area, our central location within Canada, the need for real Catholic formation both if College-age young people are to preserve their faith and if the Church is to have properly formed Catholics to carry out the reconversion of our once-Christian society, given all these; could not Canada support one or more genuine Catholic Colleges, and most specifically one in Combermere?

God expedited our work in many respects. A small core group of local professors is present in the Combermere area. In addition, the Combermere area has a rich spiritual base, due to the strong parish community, and to the consecrated laity and priests of the Madonna House Apostolate. A number of scholars, expressed a pronounced interest in supporting the endeavour in whatever way possible. Some, like Fr. Leonard Kennedy C.S.B. and Fr. Leo Sands C.S.B., are long-time professors, veterans of the Catholic university world. Others like myself are young and committed to seeking to do their part in recovering the Catholic intellectual tradition. A number of older scholars have expressed an interest in teaching after their retirement, which in many cases is near at hand. Mr. Edward King, scholar of the works of the great Catholic historian of Christian Culture, Christopher Dawson, is actively involved in the project. It is hoped that the Academy will be a means to advance important awareness of the work of Dawson in studying the impact of Christian thought and culture on the development of Western Civilization. Close collaboration with Mr. King's Dawson Centre forms a focal reference to our approach and curriculum.

Other professors, such as Dr. Michael Fox, professor of philosophy at St. Peter's Seminary in London, defender of Catholic orthodoxy and devoted scholar of the greatest of all Catholic Doctors, St. Thomas Aquinas; and Dr. Donald DeMarco, defender of true Catholic morality; along with quite a number of others, have agreed both to teach mini-courses, and to act in an advisory function to the Academy.

In addition to a faculty, we have received a substantial beginning to our library. Somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 books and bound periodicals were generously donated to us by the Cistercian Monks in Orangeville, Ontario (presently moving to the Mother Monastery in Quebec). Augmented with donations from other sources, we have a library somewhere in the neighbourhood of 35,000 volumes. Many more books are still needed, especially classic Catholic reference works, any works by St. Thomas Aquinas (Latin or English), works by Thomists such as Gilson and Garrigou LaGrange, writings by Dawson, Chesterton, Belloc, and Newman, and scholarly works dealing with philosophy, theology, patristics, literature, classical studies, Catholic social teaching, and studies in the History of Culture.

We are now in the process of looking for a place to locate the Academy. We have rented an apartment in Combermere which serves us both as project office and a storage place for some of our books. Also begun is the process of attaining tax exemption status with the first stage of incorporation as a non-profit corporation now complete. A legally constituted board of directors, including a lawyer and an accountant, have taken on responsibility for key decisions; with a steering committee handling general direction and the development of needed infrastructure.

The Academy will start out very small, with no more than 20-30 students. In the first several years, we will have a two-year intensive liberal arts program. The program will have a strong focus on personal spiritual and character formation. Intellectual emphasis will be placed on the tools of learning (logic, grammar, rhetoric, etc., the classical Trivium and Quadrivium), upon rigorous formation in the philosophical principles of St. Thomas Aquinas, upon solid doctrinal formation with a special emphasis on apologetics and evangelization, upon a Catholic great books core which emphasizes the Fathers and Doctors of the Church and upon a good grounding in the Dawsonian periods of Christian Cultural history. God willing, we hope to gradually expand so that we may become a fully accredited liberal arts college.

The need is very great! The Church throughout the world urgently needs to re-appropriate the fullness of the Catholic intellectual tradition if She is to contribute significantly to the renewal and development of a truly Catholic culture.

Christianity, in its totality as found in the one true Church, is profoundly incarnational. Faith, if it is truly living and if it is to remain so, must incarnate itself in a cultural way. It must imbue each aspect of life: political, economic, scientific, academic, familial and social. The Catholic Faith is the living out of the very indwelling of the Blessed Trinity in souls, whereby the mystical Body of Christ gradually, transforms the whole of reality, ordering it to Gospel truth, restoring all things in Christ.

The failure of Catholics to sufficiently recognize this truth has allowed the spirit of the world to bring about an anti-culture. There is a demonic metaphysic wherein Satan seeks to invert everything which the Blessed Trinity "moves" to bring about. Of course, this demonic metaphysic will inevitably fail, but countless souls hang in the balance nonetheless. What we do with the talents entrusted to us will determine the balance one way or the other for many of these souls. Karol Wojtyla, Cardinal Archbishop of Krakow, some two years before being raised to the See of St. Peter warned a gathering in New York City:

We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has gone through. I do not think that wide circles of the American society or wide circles of the Christian community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel. This confrontation lies within the plans of divine Providence. It is a trial which the whole Church... must take up. (Wall Street Journal, Nov. 9, 1978.).

Christ has triumphed. Thus, we must be filled with hope, begging Our Lady Seat of Wisdom for guidance in this effort to help bring about a new culture of life, an effort our Holy Father continually exhorts us to. Could God be calling you to help this vitally important apostolate? Many young souls are at stake. Most of all, we need your prayers, for the Academy will come into being solely by way of prayer and sacrifice! There is much to do if Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Academy for Studies in Christian Culture is to open her doors next September, yet with God all things are possible, a truth which He quietly demonstrates, a little at a time, day by day. Mary, Mother of the Church, pray for us who have recourse to Thee.