How The Light Came Back
My name is Ivan. My wife Diana and I have six beautiful daughters, five of whom currently attend OLMC.
Like so many, our family found OLMC during the pandemic, when we were searching for a place to attend Mass and confession. To our delight, we didn't just find a church, but a welcoming and loving community of families walking together towards a common goal.
At the time, my daughters were attending a prestigious, independent Catholic school. Every day we’d drop them off at a sprawling campus dotted with impressive architecture and lush athletic fields. They had access to luxuries unseen at many colleges. Yet despite spending their days in the midst of every material benefit one could imagine, they were unhappy. One, in particular, really struggled. My heart sank every time we drove to school. I would catch sight of her in the rear view mirror, curled up and visibly dreading the day. It was like watching a light fading, and one morning I thought to myself: “School can’t be this. It just can’t.”
Providentially, I happened to mention our wonderful experience at OLMC to a priest friend of mine, and he informed me that the parish runs a school too. At his prompting, I reached out to Fr. Daniel. After attending a virtual Open House, we registered the girls to shadow the very next day. When they emerged from the school that afternoon, their smiles, excitement, and joy were infectious. My wife and I knew right away we had found something special.
It’s not easy to leave a place that “ought” to be perfect for your kids, but we let our daughters’ experience be our guide, took the plunge, and enrolled them in OLMC in October of 2020, a month into the school year. I’m proud to say it was one of the greatest parental decisions we’ve ever made.
Today, the daughter who once huddled in the back seat sings in the choir, reads Shakespeare, and pushes herself in cross country. She is striving for dreams and accomplishing goals she would have never attempted at her former school. All of our girls enjoy rich discussion, interesting study, and genuine camaraderie. The other day my nine year old turned to me out of the blue and said, “You know what Dad? I really love my school.” At parent/teacher conferences, we cover their progress in math and science, but we also spend just as much time talking about their character formation and growth in virtue. In short, we found the school that has the real key to happy, thriving children, and we couldn’t be more grateful.
Ivan Arocho and his wife have been so thrilled with OLMC, they relocated to Boonton and Ivan agreed to become full-time Director of Development & Mission Advancement for the OLMC Educational Ministry.