Pictured with their families are MACCW scholarship winners (from left) Johanna Subjak, Julia Krueger (second from right) and Sara Richardson. (Submitted photos)
Johanna Subjak knows that whatever she learns in her four years of high school at the Chesterton Academy of Milwaukee, it will be the instruction pertaining to her Catholic faith — and the spiritual development that results from it — that matters more than anything.
“One of our jobs on earth is to spread the word of God and teach people about our faith,” wrote the 14-year-old graduate of Aquinas Academy in Menomonee Falls. “Everywhere I go and everyone I meet should see in me and know that God lives within me.”
Subjak wrote these words in an essay she submitted as an applicant to the annual scholarship awarded by the Milwaukee Archdiocesan Council of Catholic Women to incoming freshmen at Catholic high schools. Subjak, Julia Krueger (who will attend Divine Savior Holy Angels High School, Milwaukee) and Sara Richardson (who is headed to Catholic Memorial High School, Waukesha) were each awarded $1,500 to assist in their high school education.
The scholarships are made possible by an endowment to the MACCW by the John and Kathleen Schneider Foundation.
“This has been such a blessing from start to finish,” Subjak told the Catholic Herald. “I hoped I would be chosen to help my parents for all the hard work they do blessing me with a Catholic education.”
“The generous scholarship will make attending DSHA financially easier for my family and I very much appreciate receiving it,” said Krueger, 14, who just graduated from St. Charles School in Hartland.
MACCW reported that it received 39 applications representing students from 24 different parishes in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. Applicants wrote a 500-word essay answering one of two questions about their favorite saint and his or her influence on their future or the Catholic values they have learned that will help them in their high school career.
Krueger chose Blessed Carlo Acutis, expected to be canonized in 2025, as the inspiration for her. “Sometimes the saints are hard to relate to because many lived in such different times and circumstances, but Blessed Carlo used a website to document and teach the world about Eucharistic miracles, something any Catholic teenager can relate to,” she said.
Writing in her application essay, Krueger acknowledged “there are times in my life when I don’t feel motivated to go to church or pray to God.”
In those moments, she thinks of Blessed Carlo Acutis.
“Carlo only had 15 short years here on Earth, but he spent every moment glorifying God through all of his actions,” she wrote. His willingness to suffer deeply impacted her. “He said he was happy to die — a 15-year-old boy said he was happy to die. In my mind, that is so inspiring. Sometimes when I am praying, I think to myself, ‘If I was in Carlo’s place, would my response be the same? Would I be able to say that I was happy to die because everything I did was pleasant to God?’ This is a tough question to answer, and it really makes you think about all your life choices.”
Sara Richardson, 14, shared in her essay that the values she has learned as a member of the campus ministry team at St. Joseph School in Big Bend will help her to embody the motto of Catholic Memorial, caritas in omnibus (charity in all things).
“My role as a member of the campus ministry team is to create a sense of unity within our school and guide the students to grow in their love of Jesus Christ, truly present within each student and staff,” Richardson wrote. As a campus ministry leader, she has helped to plan events for the younger students at her school, collected donations for children in need and visited the classrooms of lower grades to “teach them a short lesson on God’s love for us by reading a book and teaching a simple craft with the kids.”
She has also channeled lessons learned as a leader in 4H and as an entrepreneur into the development of her own personal sense of charity.
“Charity in all things is just a way of life,” she wrote. “I hope to continue living my whole life as an example of caritas in omnibus.”
“Catholicism is not something you just memorize for a test. It is not something you think about on Sundays or holy days of obligation. Our religious beliefs should be incorporated in everything we do,” wrote Subjak in her essay. “Everything that I have been taught about the faith up to this point will prepare me for my life next school year. I have learned so many things about my Catholic faith, and I feel very prepared for my high school years. The more devout I am and the closer I am to Christ, getting through the ups and downs of high school will be easier.”
To learn more about the MACCW and this scholarship, visit maccw.com/awards.
