Young Catholic Teachers, United in Service TUCSON - On the Sunday night before his ninth week as a teacher, Daniel Ranschaert sat down to a communal dinner of tortilla casserole with his housemates. All eight of them had come to this desert city after finishing college in the Midwest. They share a rented home, modest paychecks and a commitment to educate the poor, the struggling and the striving in Tucson's Catholic schools. Before eating, the young teachers made the sign of the cross, clasped hands and said grace. Then, as they dug into the casserole, they talked about the test on Mesopotamia, the lesson on root words, all the things Monday morning would bring in their various classrooms. Because that day would also be Columbus Day, they slid into a conversation about the Spanish explorers and conquistadors, a tender subject in schools filled with Latino and American Indian children. For a time, as he was finishing his studies at Wabash College in Indiana, Mr. Ranschaert had thought about going into business. He kept hearing, though, about a program created nearby at the University of Notre Dame called the Alliance for Catholic Education, which put idealistic young teachers in especially needy schools. And he recalled what his own Catholic education had meant as a bulwark in a childhood marked by his parents" divorce and his brother's nearly fatal liver disease. So now, 23 years old and five months past graduating, he was sitting at dinner in his gym shorts and tank top, looking very much the bro, but feeling a mixture of anticipation and anxiety. He wasn't moving through his lesson plans on schedule. He was having to repeat so much material. Was he giving his fifth graders everything he meant to give? "You try to trust that you have an impact," he said, "whether they learn every thing or some things." In his imperfect way, Mr. Ranschaert and his housemates - Ruby Amezquita, David Bernica, Kevin De La Montaigne, Matt Gring, Rachel Hamilton, Elizabeth Shadley, Caitlin Wrend - were filling not just an educational but a spiritual gap. Notre Dame was providing them with training in education and Catholic theology, especially the social teachings on service. They, in turn, had committed two years of their young lives. Devoting themselves to society's overlooked and left-behind, voluntarily accepting a wage of $1,000 a month that is roughly at the federal poverty line, living in intentional Christian households, the 1,600 teachers produced by ACE in its 19-year history have formed the 21st-century equivalent of the sisters and brothers from Catholic religious orders whose sacrifices for decades sustained the American parochial school system. "Perhaps the ACErs were an anticipation of what the religious life would look like in the next generation," the priest and author Andrew M. Greeley wrote in his novel "The Bishop at the Lake." The Rev. Nathan Wills, a former ACE teacher who recently visited with the Tucson cohort, looked backward for an analogy. "It's a reflection of the disciples," he said. This is what the apostles did when Jesus sent them to teach. They set up communities in the midst of difficult circumstances. Thirteen hours after dinner, now wearing shirt and tie, Mr. Ranschaert stood before his students at a 150-year-old mission school on an Indian reservation south of Tucson. The second period of his day was for religion class, and today's lesson was on the Beatitudes. Weaving through the rows, Mr. Ranschaert guided a conversation about the values Jesus considered blessed and about the solace that faith can provide. "I want you to write about a time when you had to rely on God," he said. A time when you felt beat down, or there was something wrong, when your spirit was just down. A girl asked, "When someone died?" Mr. Ranschaert replied, "It could be that." As if he could intuit how he looked to the reservation's children - this white dude in glasses and nice clothes, what could ever have gone wrong in his life? - he talked a little bit about his brother's illness and the recent death of the grandfather who had been more like a parent. One pupil wrote, "When I was being bullied." Another wrote, "When me and my BFF started fighting." And a third wrote, "When my Dad went to jail." Mr. Ranschaert asked what you could do for someone feeling so hurt. He deflected the class clown, who said, "Beat him up," and went on to the other answers. Hug them. Invite them over. Give him a teddy bear. Then he talked about the forgiveness and mercy Jesus bestowed. The religion period was almost over. "When was a time," Mr. Ranschaert asked, "when you forgave someone or someone forgave you?" The children nervously giggled. It was the sound of conscience being stirred. Back at the rented house that night, Father Wills came over to celebrate Mass in the den, joking about how he had bought the sacramental wine at a convenience store. Then came takeout pizza, and some Monday-night football on TV and the inevitable return to the inevitably waiting homework. Lately, Mr. Ranschaert had gotten a tip from Ms. Hamilton and Ms. Amezquita, to assign his fifth graders to each write him a letter so he could then write back. The children told him about their favorite movies, what they did over the weekend, whom they had a crush on. They asked Mr. Ranschaert if he was married and had children. One boy, who had been so especially shy in class, invited the teacher to come and watch his youth-league football game. Mr. Ranschaert wrote back to promise he would, just as his grandfather had always been there for his baseball games. By touching those children's souls, he felt something within his own. "My faith wasn't always the strongest," he said. I didn't go to a Catholic college. I'd go to Mass with my friends, but you get lost in everything else. But I did want to give something back. I did want to show thanks for the talents I was given. Doing this work, praying at dinner, it has forced me to grow, and to build these bonds. E-mail: sgf1@columbia.edu