Classical Education and the Community

Yesterday evening six of my Latin students from North Central High School used their Classical learning to bless the lives of children at The Julian Center, a nonprofit agency providing counseling, safe shelter, and education for survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and other life crises.

Last fall we accepted submissions from student-authors of the classic myth of Phaethon, re-told in a way suitable for children. Two versions were selected by a panel of teachers, and when the illustrations had been completed by another student, The Tale of Phaethon was published.

Students and families then raised funds to purchase copies of the book to give to children at The Julian Center. Interested students attended an after-school session to learn how to read effectively to a young audience, and last night they brought the project full circle.

It was amazing to watch these elementary-aged children, who have suffered mightily in their young lives, sparkle with excitement as the high school students read the book and intereacted with them. When they were presented with their own autographed copies of the book, they positively beamed.

The motto of The Libri Juliani Project is antiquitatem legere est videre futurum...to read the past is to see the future. This is but a shorthand way of saying what Cicero said so eloquently in his Pro Archia, a speech in defense of the poet Aulus Licinius Archias. Ceteros pudeat si qui ita se litteris abdiderunt ut nihil ex eis possint neque in aspectum lucemque proferre, neque in communum adferre fructum. "Let others be ashamed if they have so hidden themselves away in literature that they can bring forth nothing into the light to be seen or can offer nothing for the public good."