Groups disagree on the real Our Lady of Mercy successor

MADISON — A shoreline Catholic school and a “Catholic-based” independent academy are sparring over which one is the true successor to Our Lady of Mercy School in Madison, ,which closed last school year.

Just five months after the closing of Our Lady of Mercy School on Neck Road, the

Rev. Daniel J. McLearen of St. Margaret Roman Catholic Church is warning parishioners that there is one and only one successor to OLM, which is East Shoreline Catholic Academy in Branford.

The message was delivered to church attendees both verbally and in writing Nov. 25.

“Beginning in September 2018, the combined school is called East Shoreline Catholic Academy,” McLearen wrote in the letter. “It is East Shoreline Catholic Academy (ESCA) that is the successor to Our Lady of Mercy School, and it is East Shoreline Catholic Academy that is the only Catholic school in the Guilford, Madison, Branford region. A contribution to OLM Prep does not benefit East Shoreline Catholic Academy or its students.”

Our Lady of Mercy School, at 149 Neck Road, Madison, closed at the end of the 201718 school year. East Shoreline Catholic Academy opened at the site of the former St. Mary School in Branford.

However, parents who did not want their children, former students of OLM, to go to ESCA in Branford, started another school, OLM Prep. It was created by a group of OLM parents, students, alumni and community supporters interested in forming a new, independent Catholicbased school in Madison.

A recent mailing, soliciting donations to OLM Prep, stated, “As we begin a new year, in a new location, with a new school leader, we are truly blessed for success. We want to embrace past, present and future OLM students and celebrate the continuation of 64 years of excellence in Madison.”

McLearen wrote that this solicitation by OLM Prep confused many parishioners and former OLM families.

“OLM Prep seeks to reach out to ‘alumni,’ despite opening its doors in 2018,” he wrote in his letter. “In this way it attempts further to blur and conflate its threemonth operational history with the parishes’ 12-year history of operating Our

Lady of Mercy School at Neck Road.”

John Picard, OLM Prep spokesman, disagreed with this statement.

“We are carrying on the tradition of the last 60 years,” he said. “We’re in Madison, we’re staying in Madison. It was not a diocesan school when the Sisters of Mercy first started it and we’re going to be a very successful school.”

However, McLearen’s letter goes on to say, “We believe that OLM Prep is using the mailing list that was compiled by the parishes’ Our Lady of Mercy School. This is being done without the parishes’ permission.”

Picard said the lists were freely circulated within the OLM community.

“It wasn’t a secret list,” he said. “It’s not an illegal document.”

McLearen said “OLM Prep claims to be the ‘successor’ school to Our Lady of Mercy School, despite having no relationship with the parishes’ Our Lady of Mercy School.

“Without authorization or permission, OLM Prep incorporates into its materials the parishes’ Our Lady of Mercy School logo to create a timeline of “OLM Through the Years” — creating the misperception that a connection exists with the prior Our Lady of Mercy Schools. No such connection exists.”

Picard argued there because many of OLM’s families are now associated with OLM Prep, this makes it a successor to OLM.

“We’re in Madison,” he said. “We have the students who went there. Our parents and our families are largely from Madison. We’re keeping up the traditions from that school.”

Picard said that what is going on is a common thread in the Catholic church.

“They try to demean and belittle and intimidate and bully their victims so they go away,” he said. “We’re not going away.

“They’re calling us frauds,” said Picard. “Think about what he said. It’s disgusting.”

In an email to the ShoreLine Times, McLearen stated the church’s position on the matter.

“OLM Prep is a new private school that opened its doors in September 2018,” wrote McLearen. “It is not Catholic and it is not sponsored or connected with the parishes. It is an entirely separate and distinct entity from the Our Lady of Mercy School operated by the parishes on Neck Road for 12 years.”