Five- and 6-year-old Montessori students at Sacred Heart School, Norco, recently showed how even young children can grasp the loving sacrifice Jesus made to conquer sin, and even death. Above, Jesus (Junious Mosby) finds his apostles asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane.

“Kevin Briggs,” the LEGO-built robot designed and programmed by St. Dominic School’s robotics team, maneuvers around its farm-like playing field to corral pigs, milk cows, snatch cameras off the back of seals and extract honey from a hive.

Mount Carmel Academy art teacher Bridget Gillane’s passion for using and making natural bath products has bubbled over into a soap-making project with students in two extracurricular clubs on campus.

“A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system,” warns Pope Francis in his landmark environmental encyclical Laudato Si (“On Care for Our Common Home”).

While God is many things – including humankind’s all-powerful and ever-forgiving creator – there is one divine characteristic that sometimes gets forgotten by young and old alike. God is surprising, said Father Peter Finney, administrator of St. Rita Parish in New Orleans, especially when he reveals how we might use our gifts and unveil ones we might not have even realized we possessed.

He learned to play the game of football under one of the most demanding head coaches imaginable. As a senior on the 1963 Holy Cross football team, Barry Wilson – a center and linebacker – was a team captain.

Presenting a business plan to judges April 26 marked the culmination of the year-long math elective “Financial Literacy” for six Academy of the Sacred Heart seniors. Three, two-student teams  stood before a panel of local business men and women and made pitches – through a detailed business plan and video – about why their business should be granted a start-up loan.

Visitation of Our Lady School in Marrero took both titles in the CSAL Boys’ Indoorball Championships, played May 15 at St. Dominic. The finals took place after the press deadline for the May issue of Kids’ Clarion, so the winning teams are featured below.

Elderly residents who live in parts of Jefferson Parish, including Kenner, Jefferson, River Ridge, the West Bank neighborhoods of Gretna, Lafitte and Marrero and Orleans, St. Bernard and Plaquemines civil parishes, can now access comprehensive health care services through PACE Greater New Orleans, a ministry of Catholic Charities Archdiocese of New Orleans.

New Orleanians tend to hold their faith and traditions close to their hearts. On April 29, 2017, the Lubrano and Cazaubon families proved this to be true when Haleen Cazaubon, 8, walked down the aisle of Our Lady of Prompt Succor Church in Chalmette wearing the first Communion dress that her mother, Antoinette Lubrano Cazaubon, wore more than 30 years before at the same church.

Sheryl Sandberg, dressed in black, sat in a chair next to Mary Matalin on the stage of the Academy of the Sacred Heart’s Nims Fine Arts Center on St. Charles Avenue last week, klieg lights in her eyes, with an audience of 1,200, mostly women, in relative darkness, holding her book, “Option B,” and hanging on her every syllable.

Tuvo el difícil deber de celebrar la Misa fúnebre la semana pasada para el Padre John Arnone, que murió a la edad de 49 años. ¿Cuáles fueron sus sentimientos? Me entristeció perder tal sacerdote joven y dedicado.

You had the difficult duty of celebrating the funeral Mass last week for Father John Arnone, who died at the age of 49. What were your feelings? I was sad to lose such a young and dedicated priest. I felt grief.

FATIMA, Portugal – A visit to three children a century ago inspired a visit from Catholic pilgrims around the world last weekend. Pope Francis and travelers from New Orleans and central Louisiana were among the estimated 500,000 pilgrims who arrived at the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima on Saturday, May 13, for the 100th anniversary of the Virgin Mary’s appearance to the three little shepherds – Lucia dos Santos and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto – as they tended their families’ herd of sheep during the days of WWI.

In order to provide pastoral care for the people of God in the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Archbishop Aymond has made the following appointments: Pastors (All appointments for pastors are for a six-year term, which may be renewed.)

St. Pius X fifth grader Meredith Kononchek can tell you anything you want to know about her favorite president, George H.W. Bush. Not only did Bush, the youngest Navy pilot of his era, survive after his plane was shot down in World War II, he also was in full command of his faculties, Meredith notes.

The Serra Clubs of the New Orleans area held a Mass, awards ceremony and banquet April 26 at St. Rita Church, New Orleans, to honor the 2017 Altar Servers of the Year from parishes in the archdiocese.

As children we memorize the Ten Commandments, learning of the fourth commandment: “Honor your father and mother.” This loving command is second only to the love and devotion we have to God, seen in the first three commandments.

Attending a Holy Spirit novena for the first time a few years ago in Lacombe was life-changing for Deacon Ricky Suprean and so many others. “Everybody’s gifts have been enhanced, everybody’s devotion to the church has become a deeper devotion,” Deacon Suprean said.

Knowing how painful an uncomfortable undergarment can be, two Mount Carmel seniors imagined and pitched the idea of the Effortless Activewear sports bra at the 2017 Greater New Orleans “Trust Your Crazy Ideas Challenge” (TYCIC) sponsored by Junior Achievement and the (Drew) Brees Dream Foundation.