In the concluding paragraph of his rather romantic and timeless book Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton asserts the following:

“Joy, which is the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian.”

This joy, this mirth, is great inside joke of Christendom – that the last laugh is with the Church and on the world.

This same joy is the defining characteristic of any school which seeks a model of Christian discipleship as its integrating pedagogy.  The Church is Joy; the school therefore must be ruled by Joy; and it is Joy that most profoundly forms the soul of a child. This idea lies underneath every aspect of education at The Academy; this joy suffuses every sheet of wide-ruled notebook paper and unsharpened pencil with the laughter of liberty.