An ‘Easter person’: A life of faith guides Mickey Lentz as she leads Catholic education in the archdiocese
Annette “Mickey” Lentz talks with students at the annual A Promise to Keep: God’s Gift of Human Sexuality awards luncheon on March 6 at the Archbishop O’Meara Catholic Center in Indianapolis. The archdiocesan volunteer peer mentor chastity program is in its 14th year. (Photo by Mary Ann Wyand)
By John Shaughnessy
Let’s start with the story that many people share about Annette “Mickey” Lentz, the one about how the longtime Catholic educator earned a license to drive school buses so she could make a special connection with her students and the regular bus drivers.
“I had the license for four or five years,” Lentz says with a smile, recalling part of her time as the principal at St. Mark School in Indianapolis from 1977 to 1989. “I got it to put myself in the shoes of the bus drivers so I could empathize with them. I substituted on the routes about once a week. It also let the kids see me in a different light. The kids were so well-behaved.”
Then there’s the story that begins when she was a young teacher leading a classroom of 54 students—that’s right, 54—at St. Patrick School in Indianapolis in the 1960s.
The overwhelming number of students in that classroom would seem to preclude making a noticeable difference in the life of a struggling child. Yet Lentz recently received a note and business card from a former student who had often been a challenge in her classroom, a former student who thanked her for her help in turning around his life.
“He thanked me for the discipline and structure I gave him,” notes Lentz, who is now in her 47th year as a Catholic educator, including the last 10 years as the archdiocese’s executive director of Catholic Education and Faith Formation. “Those stories happen enough to me that I know I’ve chosen the right vocation. This is what God has chosen me to do.”
Those two stories alone offer an insight into why the 66-year-old Lentz will be honored soon by the National Catholic Educational Association for her outstanding, lifelong dedication to Catholic education and the Church. Lentz will receive the 2008 F. Sadlier Dinger Award during the NCEA’s annual convention in Indianapolis on March 25-28.
Still, Father Daniel Staublin believes there’s one more story that needs to be told to show the true heart of Lentz.
Life as an ‘Easter person’
A longtime friend, Father Staublin recalls how Lentz cared for her husband of 31 years, Jim, in the last years of his life before he died in 1995.
“Through the illness and death of her husband, she showed the power of her faith,” says Father Staublin, the pastor of St. Malachy Parish in Brownsburg. “When Jim died, she was sad but she knew he continued to live on and she needed to live on. She’s an Easter person. She knows that our faith is a faith of life ultimately. We know there’s the Resurrection, and it gets us through the crosses of our life. That’s why there’s a joy to her.”
It’s a joy that seems to pervade every part of life for the mother of two and the doting grandmother of four. She has a passion for movies, shopping, traveling, practical jokes, the Indianapolis Colts and the music of Barry Manilow.
“She has a charisma about her,” says Jeannine Vesper, another longtime friend. “She’s fun, too, which I think is important. We’ve shared a lot of laughs and a few tears along the way. I had thought she would have probably retired a year or two ago, but this vocation hooks you. I’m sure she loves what she does. I think that’s what keeps her going. She’s very dedicated to Catholic education.”
She has also excelled in directing the archdiocese’s efforts in education.
She leads a school system in which 25 of the 71 Catholic schools in the archdiocese have now earned recognition as a Blue Ribbon School of Excellence by the U.S. Department of Education—a distinction that no other diocese in the country can match.
She guides a school system in which
the Catholic high school graduation rate
in the archdiocese is 97 percent, and about 94 percent of Catholic high school graduates in the archdiocese attend college.
She works to make Catholic education a possibility for children from all walks of life, viewing the six Mother Theodore Catholic Academies in Indianapolis as schools that can make a faith-oriented difference to children from economically poor families.
“I couldn’t imagine anyone more qualified to be the executive director of an archdiocesan Office of Catholic Education,” says Archbishop Daniel M. Buechlein. “Mickey is a natural problem solver, a positive thinker who works with the challenging realities that go with overseeing a sizeable school system. She is sensitive to suffering and strong in the face of adversity.
“As a matter of course, Mickey is exemplary and strong in the practice of the Catholic faith.”
One person, one vision, one team
That faith guides her life and her work in educating children.
“I do what I do so that our youth will be successful,” Lentz says. “Catholic education just shapes their whole being.
It’s the foundation, the base they need to challenge themselves for the future. It’s a holistic approach to shaping the mind, the body and the spirit. It’s all I’ve ever known. And it’s truly what I believe.”
As she talks, Lentz sits in her office at the Catholic Center in Indianapolis. Behind her desk is a prominent picture of a lighthouse, one of the most important images in her life because of the way lighthouses lead the way for others.
On the same wall is a framed version of one of her favorite sayings: “Leadership and change begin in a room with one person and one vision. One person can indeed make a profound difference.”
A favorite Scripture passage showcased in her office is Psalm 25:4-6. It reads, “Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths, guide me in your truth.”
“It’s through prayer and Scriptures that I get my strength, I get my support,” she says. “One person can make a difference, but that one person is surrounded by many people who make a team. If you don’t have that conviction, it isn’t going to happen.”
As the youngest of five children, Lentz often felt she was in the shadows of her older siblings. She was given the nickname “Mickey” by her father shortly after she was born, a nickname she believes she received from him because of his desire to have another son.
After her mother died when Lentz was 16, she and her father lived in the family home together. Following her sophomore year at Marian College in Indianapolis, her dad encouraged her to get a job and she sought one as a teacher at St. Patrick School, which she had attended as a child.
“I was greener than green,” she says. “But I loved the kids. I loved having an impact on their lives and I never stopped.”
She married her husband in 1964 and their family soon grew to include their daughter, Marcy, and their son, Rob.
Lentz’s “extended family” also continued to grow through her years as a teacher, a principal and an administrator. She relied on all her families when Jim became ill with heart and liver problems.
“I always tried to be the one who could fix things, whether it be a kid in my class or my own children,” she recalls. “In this case, I couldn’t fix it. I wanted to be there for him. He was always there for me. He was always my silent supporter. It was tough. My faith, my kids and my family here stepped up to the plate. I felt their support and we made it.”
She pauses.
“I always try to see the brighter side, the blessings. There is too much going on in this world not to.”
Moments to treasure
“She’s one of the most helpful and generous people you can meet,” says another longtime friend, Jeff Stumpf, the chief financial officer of the archdiocese.
Stumpf mentions how, with Lentz in her 60s, she opened her home for a year to one of her nieces who was struggling to find her place in the world.
“Here she is nearing retirement age and she’s taking in a 20-year-old,” he says.
Asked about that story, Lentz deflects any praise, saying she imagined what her husband, Jim, would have done.
“He was very kind,” she says. “I took her in.”
That action reflects the selflessness that often marks her life. For years now, she has had a dream of stepping aside from education to own and operate her own clothing boutique, but she never has, putting the needs and hopes of others before her own wishes. Still, she talks about the possibility.
“I’d still love to, but I don’t know if I will,” says Lentz, who earned a bachelor’s degree at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College and a master’s degree at Butler University in Indianapolis. “I have the name for the store, ‘Treasures.’ I love shopping and I love values. It would be a moment to treasure.”
Until then, she can look back on 47 years as an educator in which she has created numerous moments to treasure for many people.
Until then, she’s still looking forward to being a part of the difference that Catholic education can make for children.
“I’ve seen the results. I’ve seen the lives that Catholic education produces,” she says. “I can’t imagine Catholic education not being a part of my life.
“My faith has been my rock. It’s made me who I am. It’s told me I can put my mind to whatever I want to do. Every morning, I pray, ‘Give me the faith, give me the strength, to do what I need to do.’ My faith has gotten me through all the challenges of my life. It’s all I am.”†
