A Catholic Founding and History
“The will of God be done in this and everything we undertake.”
Blessed Edmund Rice
St. Anselm’s owes its existence to the life of Blessed Edmund Rice, who founded the Christian Brother’s Order. Edmund Rice lived at worked around the turn of the 19th century among the poor of Ireland. His Order of Christian Brothers sought to live out their faith through action; recognising, as do we in our Mission Statement, that there is an inherent dignity in all human beings, and that they deserve equal respect as part of God’s Creation.
To this end the Christian Brothers came to Birkenhead, and sought to establish a Catholic school for the education of local boys. St Anselm’s College was founded in 1933 to serve the local population – and so it continues to do today. St Anselm’s owes its existence to the Christian Brothers, and is determined to stay true to its founding. More than this, St Anselm’s is part of the wider Catholic Church, in much the same way as the parishes and monasteries in our local area. We are under the religious authority of Bishop Mark Davies, who administers the Diocese of Shrewsbury. Further, the College has an international association with the Christian Brother Network, sharing a common origin point in Blessed Edmund Rice with schools all over the world.
In the College Mission Statement we claim to be inspired by Gospel Values, which are communicated to us by the teachings of the Church. These are central to our College life, and inform the education and activities we provide. This is what makes St Anselm’s unique, and we believe it is what makes the education we provide here so special.
Faith and Action
“…faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
James 2:17
As a part of the Church we recognise our responsibility to participate ever more fully in the Church’s life. We identify the Mass as being the centre and source of this life. The Mass is at once a commemoration of our past and present sins, and all those of fallen humanity; a memorial of Christ’s death upon Calvary through which those sins were atoned; and a Eucharistic celebration by which we re-affirm and re-vitalise our hope for the future. As a Catholic School we seek celebrate the Mass as often as possible, be it with the whole school, with year and key-stage groups, or with single forms.
Everything in our College life takes it legitimacy from the Mass, but our faith is marked in other smaller ways on a daily basis. Form groups undertake form time prayer, we seek to base our assemblies upon the Gospel message given each Sunday, and we hold various liturgical celebrations to mark important dates in the school year and in the national calendar. These are the means by which we hope to instil Faith and help it grow. However, the Church believes that true faith resolves itself upon Action. The College has an excellent tradition of translating piety and prayer into action.
St Anselm’s supports a number of charities through the year, following the seasons of the Church as it does. The Saint Vincent de Paul Society works constantly throughout the year to bring our charity into action, and our Edmund Rice International Group supports these endeavours with its education initiatives and student advocacy. The students are constantly engaged with the College causes, working to host events in the College for the community, and with international organisations to aid those in other countries.
Faith in Education
“I do not seek to understand in order that I may believe, but rather, I believe in order that I may understand”
St Anselm of Canterbury
The College motto, Fides, Quarenes, Intellectum or “Faith, Seeking, Understanding” is given us by our Patron Saint, Anselm of Canterbury. St Anselm is a great man of the Church, who came to England to serve as the Archbishop of Canterbury around a thousand years ago. He is famous for the close connection he saw between Faith and Reason. There two, Anselm believed, were entirely compatible; but the faculties of Reason employed by the Mind could only be turned to true Understanding by way of Faith. Faith gives Humility, its prompts Virtue, and it provides a framework into which human knowledge can be fit. We at St Anselm’s seek to follow the example of our namesake: approaching every discipline and subject through the lense of faith. Faith for us is not like an ideology or a certain belief: it is something that offers direction and purpose for life itself, towards which every minute of every day can be directed. This naturally leads us to conclude that our educational role at St Anselm’s is not simply an academic one – but one that concerns the whole person. We seek to shape and form young men who will do Good in our society: we seek to equip them with true knowledge, and the means to employ that knowledge in the right ways. Thus our Mission is not limited to the years that students spend at St Anselm’s, but is concerned with the manner by which they will live their entire lives.
