Resurrection School will rise above another trial

    The yellow and beige processional cross, fashioned from cardboard and construction paper, was as light as a feather. The sinister act that forced the faculty of Resurrection of Our Lord School in New Orleans East to create it was about as dark and heavy as a sin can be.
    When Father MichaelJoseph Nguyen celebrated Mass Feb. 17 for about 100 Resurrection students inside the cafeteria of the former St. Paul the Apostle School in Gentilly, he was led to the altar – a cafeteria table – by fifth grader Jailen Doyle, who proudly held up the handmade cross as a sign of triumph.
    In the pre-dawn hours of Feb. 14, someone set a series of fires inside Resurrection School. The arsonist – or arsonists – soaked the school’s hallways with a flammable liquid and then torched the building in several locations.
With clear evidence of multiple flashpoints, arson investigators with the New Orleans Fire Department, the State Fire Marshal and the federal bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms determined right away that this was no electrical fire. In fact, among the evidence was a string of burned T-shirts, tied together to make a serpentine wick.
    When neighbors smelled smoke, the fire department was alerted at 6:24 a.m., and the fire was extinguished 31 minutes later. But by that time, fire and smoke had heavily damaged St. Joseph’s Hall, one of the school’s two main wings, and 460 students suddenly were made homeless.
    For a school that was inundated and nearly swallowed whole by Hurricane Katrina – only to rebuild and flourish again – the crime was particularly bitter. In December, the school had received two anonymous letters, which included the threat, “You will pay.”
    When students returned to school from the Christmas holidays, police provided additional security for several weeks. No one knows if the threats are connected to the fire, but the timing certainly is suspicious.
    Dr. Si Nguyen, Resurrection principal since 2003, said he could not fathom what would prompt someone to set fire to a school.
    “I’ve been principal of this school for the past nine years, and we’ve never had so much as graffiti or a broken window,” he said. “I’ve left the school in the evening, late at night, after meetings, and this is a quiet neighborhood. We all know the neighbors. This is just an unfortunate situation.”
    While restoration crews worked last week to remediate the extensive damage, Resurrection set up a modified school schedule at the former St. Paul the Apostle School. About 100 students showed up last Thursday and Friday, and teachers tried to keep the day as normal as possible, even holding a pre-Mardi Gras parade in the cafeteria.
    “I promise we will all go home again, all right?” Father Nguyen told the students at the Mass on Feb. 17. “I want to assure you and your families that we are here and we will offer our Mass in a very simple way. I want to thank God because all of you are safe. If one of us got hurt, I would be very sorry.”
    Wearing blue vestments in honor of the Blessed Mother, Father Nguyen told the students: “Our Lady teaches us to be good Christians and to love God and to pray for whoever did it. We ask for healing and forgiveness. We don’t know who did it, but in our hearts we want to reach out with Christian charity to that person.”
    Before the Mass, Father Nguyen was searching for answers. He knows how hard his community worked to restore the church and school after Katrina. And now, this.
    “In my mind, Katrina was a disaster of Mother Nature,” he said. “Here, somebody did it – somebody really violent. We didn’t do anything, especially the children. Why did you do that to them?”
    Plans call for the pre-kindergarten students to return Feb. 27 to the Resurrection campus in the wing of the building that was less affected by the fire. The rest of the students probably will remain at St. Paul School until St. Joseph’s Hall is restored, perhaps in another month.
    Si Nguyen said he’s never been prouder of his teachers, who have endured so much in the last 6 1/2 years. He also has been showered with offers of help from the archdiocesan Office of Catholic Schools and from principals throughout the area.
    “There’s been an outpouring of prayers and support,” he said. “It shows that we are truly a family in the archdiocese. My assistant principal, Marie Comeaux, told me that a child came out of school and said, ‘I had a really good day today.’ That’s what it’s all about – to see the smile on that child’s face and to see a smile on a parent’s face.”
    Lift high the cross.
    For information on how to help Resurrection School, call 242-8669.
    Peter Finney Jr. can be reached at [email protected].