Miracle on High Street: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of St. Benedict's Prep in Newark, N.J.

Conclusion

Conclusion The shadow from the cross high above St. Mary’s starts early in the morning near where William Street and Springfield Avenue meet. Father Edwin Leahy once walked to that corner of the abbey’s property in the mid-1980s and looked back toward the school buildings in front of the skyscrapers that dot Newark’s skyline. He thought, ‘‘We have from here all the way down to the telephone company building on Arlington Street. How the hell did that all happen?’’1 Since then three buildings—a gymnasium with classrooms, a library, and a dormitory —have been built on the property that served as a ball field for the first students at St. Benedict’s. ‘‘I look at what we’ve done, where we are now,’’ added the headmaster, ‘‘and I wonder to myself—how the heck did we come so far? I guess I was just so naı̈ve back then I didn’t realize what we were trying to do could not possibly be done.’’2 When looking for explanation to what has happened at St. Benedict ’s Prep and Newark Abbey, the monks understandably turn to the divine. Abbot Melvin Valvano mentioned the ‘‘unexplainable hand of God’’ and ‘‘the utter mysteriousness of it all.’’3 Ten years after starting his journal in 1972, Father Albert Holtz ruminated on doing the impossible: The Lord has been awfully busy over the past ten years working with a group of men, a bunch of buildings and a wild variety of kids. The ‘‘God of Surprises’’ has stood by us: leading, chiding, guiding, and always, always surprising us. His goodness to us has been utterly amazing. All the forks in the road, and he’d point us the right way at each one; all the times of doubt and discouragement , and he’d cheer us with some new surprises each time. Just when we’d conclusion | 255 be encouraged by some great success, he’d top it with another even better. He’s been lavish in His blessings: He’s blessed us with trials and heartaches, with fears and apprehensions, with challenges and opportunities, with good friends and healthy bodies and strength and enthusiasm, with a holy abbot and a masterful headmaster, with fundraising success and a good reputation. ‘‘Prosper the work of our hands, O Lord!’’ Didn’t He ever! In His all-seeing foresight He knew that St. Benedict’s and Newark Abbey would prosper over these ten years. As this has unfolded day by day in our lives He has been teaching us one lesson in so many ways: how much He loves us!4 ‘‘You have to inject the mystery of God into it,’’ offered Father Edwin. ‘‘It has been just ordinary folks doing extraordinary things through God’s grace.’’5 His mother, Jean Leahy, concurs, saying, ‘‘I’m convinced that the Holy Spirit was there, and still is, working through the men, women and children in Newark. There is something there that no one can explain, but everyone wants to know how it happened. It’s the Holy Spirit directing it all and working through the people there.’’6 Fred Smith, the Rhodes Scholar from Harvard University, called it a miracle. While many see what has transpired on High Street over the last forty years as miraculous, it has been the monks’ stability of place that has made the urban abbey and school remarkably resilient. St. Benedict’s Prep’s has evolved from a ‘‘day college’’ for the sons of white ethnic immigrants to an urban Catholic prep school for mostly minority males. Born as a result of one riot, the school nearly died in another. According to the historian Mike Davis, places like Newark have faced three phases of neighborhood destruction since the 1950s, when the twin forces of urban renewal and highway construction began to rip a hole right through old urban centers. Next came the events of the 1960s and the hundreds of urban riots that wreaked havoc on the commercial life of the inner city. Finally, in the 1970s and 1980s, a long period of ‘‘disinvestment’’ led by local banks and endorsed by federal policies created what another scholar has called the ‘‘urban prairie .’’7 The monks survived all three cataclysms. In particular, the monks survived the ‘‘desert experience’’ in the aftermath of the announcement to close St. Benedict’s Prep in 1972. In 256 | conclusion fact...