I had the blessing of being formed by Fr. Ron Nuzzi during my time as a student in the University of Notre Dame's Mary Ann Remick Leadership Program.
Fr. Nuzzi filled our hearts with conviction for the mission of our Church and her Catholic schools, our minds with the knowledge and skill to be competent Catholic school leaders, and our notebooks with one-liners, zingers, and compelling messages.
One such line, "It's not about you!" still echoes in my heart more than 15 years after this line boomed in my ears. Speaking about his frustration with faculty members who wanted to grade papers during Mass, Fr. Nuzzi recalled exclaiming these words in an attempt to get us to recognize that our efforts as school leaders must account for the following:
- Everything the adults in our buildings do makes a statement about what we deem important.
- When our ministries become more about us than our students' formation, we have - or eventually will - become ineffective.
Our Gospel from this past weekend reminded me of these words, "It's not about you!" In response to the disciples' arguments about who was the greatest among them, Jesus explains how to receive honor in His kingdom: "If anyone wishes to be first, he shall be the last of all and the servant of all." Jesus then goes deeper by putting a child (imagine our students) in the middle of the group, embracing this young person, and declaring, "Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me."
It's not about you.
Go to the lowest among us, lower yourself to meet them at their level, and embrace them in the name of Christ and His commission to us, "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you" (Mt. 28:19-20).
Put another way: be humble enough to serve. It's not about you. It's about our students and families who have entrusted themselves to our care and education. It's about the missions of our schools that we have been commissioned to carry out. It's about the Holy Spirit-inspired dreams that God aches for us to make a reality. It's about the details needed to carry out our missions and bring to life our visions. It's about collaborating with others across our boards, our faculties and staffs, our network and our diocesan offices to achieve God's plans for His schools. It's about vulnerably looking at the data and analyzing our effectiveness in doing what we've been called to do. It's about pursuing excellence in all things for God's glory, not ours.
It's not about me. It's not about you.
It's about Him and His children and His schools.
God, it's about You: it's Yours.
All Yours.
