To apply DC to a religious school although we aren't religious at all

campaign then for all religion to be taken out of all state schools? I’ve seen people choose private religious schools and disagree with the religion part so I’m not sure that would solve OPs issue. Plus I rarely see this concern about COE schools which leads me to believe it might be type of religion rather than religion itself that is the issue to many people.

Meh I was baptised ,had my first holy communion ,was confirmed. etc I'm an extremely lapsed Catholic
My son was also baptised and took his first holy communion ,went to Catholic schools and decided he was atheist from around 12.

Well it's a belief, and others have different beliefs
Also give children some credit they will make their own minds up about Wether they belive or not ,I certainly did as did my son.

The terrifying result is that a child has been conned into believing what is an untruth. We owe a duty to children to treat their innocent minds with respect and not to manipulate this blank sheet into the beliefs of one religion.

And what was the terrifying result of her taking her First Holy Communion?

Are there places where the only school in Catholic? I can believe areas where the only school is C of E as its the State religion but it would be very odd ( and remiss of the LA) to only have a Catholic school in an area.

That's how it is at your school .... but it seems that this is not the case with the school the OP is referring to, hence her problem.

You have to be prepared for all the prayers and religious activities your child will do. I enquired at our local Catholic school. Your child will not sit out, they'll be a part of everything. My niece went to one and became so indoctrinated that she asked to have a confirmation and her first holy communion. Because school encouraged her to. They encourage them to go to Sunday mass which are also linked to house points.

I mean, I AM Catholic and did the bare minimum to bring my kids up in the Catholic faith! I do regret it now really as I feel its a part of me ( and them) that I've let wither away a bit. My culture is very deeply ingrained in Catholicism.

I am a Governor at a Catholic High School.

We have about 40% non-Catholics. We have a Hijab as part of the uniform policy, we have Pride Week, we have information about all other major world religions posted round school. Mass is not mandatory, everyone has to take RE GCSE, but it’s more rounded than you think. We have allsorts of family units, and nobody is excluded due to Race / Religion / Sexuality.

Yes we get funding from the LA, on a par with other school in the area, plus we get funding from the Diocese, which allows us to keep our buildings in good order.

Nobody is expected to partake in the Catholic life of the school, if they do not wish to.

They are being forced to send their child to school, and they have paid via their taxes for a free state education. And now they find that this comes with religious strings attached. That the school with the best academic or other results, or the school with the nearest and safest journey, requires them to agree to their child being indoctrinated into one particular religion.
Does that sound morally right?

But she’s not being forced to go to a religious school they are choosing a religious school

But she is not being forced by the state to go to a swimmimg pool! She IS being forced by law to send her child to school.
Supposing it were a Christian Scientist (or Buddhist, or Muslim, or Seventh Day Adventist or any other religious) school that your child had to attend .. would the same rules apply? Do parents have to send their children to a school of any religious bias under the state system?
Religion should come from.the home; state schools should teach about all religions and about morality .... but they should not plug one biased doctrine.

Absolutely apply but you need your child to buy into the ethos of the school and engage with prayers and bible studies

you wouldn’t send your child to a swimming pool and say you don’t sent them to get wet so you can’t send them to a religious school and say you don’t want them to learn about god

I think you are missing the point. It is about the basic principle of state schools having a religious bias that is fundamentally wrong.

Of course parents want their child to go to the nearest school that has a good track record academically and behaviourally (they are paying for this via their taxes ... it is a right) , but it is wrong that this should entail tiptoeing around religious indoctrination.

I find it quite interesting that Catholic schools take funding from the state AT ALL and, in the case of some incoming academies have been gifted land and buildings www.secularism.org.uk/news/2025/07/nss-warns-council-against-spending-55mn-on-catholic-super-school. https://humanists.uk/2025/05/12/welsh-government-to-spend-over-100-million-on-two-new-catholic-schools-the-church-will-own/

A full overview of the types of funding and status of land, buildings is here: https://humanists.uk/wp-content/uploads/schools-with-a-religious-character.pdf

There are 700 schools which are academies that are Catholic and funded in the same way, including capital expenditure, as any other academy. There are a further 1400 Catholic schools that are VA who are meant to pay 10% of building costs. Some may do this from diocese funds (as they should as the ownership remains with them in trust). some
seem to be scraping this back from ALL parents https://humanists.uk/2015/09/03/bha-research-reveals-shocking-number-of-state-faith-schools-demanding-money-from-parents/

anyhow, it’s quite the stretch that Catholic schools are somehow relieving the state of financial obligations in education and if the attendees of mass do not wish their money to be diverted to schools, perhaps they could consider petitioning against schools with a religious character?

It's not the Catholicism per se. Any school that requires any kind of extra effort to get a place there, gets better academic results than a school in the same kind of geographical/demographical location that has no additional requirements for applicants. This is simply because of the large number of people in the world who want to get through life with the minimum possible amount of effort, who have children who want to get through life with the minimum possible amount of effort. Filter that group out of any gathering of 11-16yos and the remainder will be kids that are more likely than average to put in effort.

absolutely - I’d love it too! But it’s disingenuous to say it’s her only option - it’s the easiest which isn’t the same. And lots of people choose to say a few prayers because they want the specific school and it’s part of the package - I get that. But saying you want catholic school but would prefer if it wasn’t catholic…. Is bizarre and naive.

She presumably also wants the school because her kid can walk there and the commute is all of a couple of minutes. It sounds as if it's practically close enough that the OP wouldn't even have to get out of her pyjamas but could just watch them from the front window.

No offense intended, but I'd happily say a few prayers for a school run like that.

How did I guess it was a Catholic school. Why are the Catholic schools so much better than the non catholic ones?

OP is based in London - do you think that’s the only school in the city? Of course there’s another option. OP wants this school, presumably it’s preferable for academic and behavioural reasons, but she would also like the school to change their polices for her. Equally, she could ask the other local non religious schools to obtain outstanding ratings and better academic results?

What non catholics don’t realise is that a certain percentage of the mass offering contributes to local catholic schools’ education so the more catholics who attend the local school and local church, the more funding that catholic schools receive. So non catholics are quite happy to attend a catholic school, not attend mass and not contribute to the coffers whilst expecting their child to
be excused from worship or religious teaching but receive education that their peers partly fund. I wish the Church were more transparent about how catholic schools are funded and I wish more people would explore the readily available data to see that catholic schools are not fully funded like other schools and rely on the local diocese to plug the gap. Consequently, catholic schools receive less funding per head than other schools. Catholic school don’t have access to grants that other state school do either. It’s quite interesting but frustrating that non catholics think they have a right to attend schools that require funding from the very community they don’t wish to be part of.

Here is Scotland the set-up is much better. There are RC schools across the central belt and some of the other cities. Where there are RC schools every home is in the (fixed) catchment area for both an RC school and a non-denominational school. When my DDs started school we were in catchment for both Suburb-name Primary (non-denominational) and St John's Primary (RC). No one would be forced to go to an RC school on the basis that there isn't a non-denominational school locally.
Places in the RC schools give priority to RC children but anyone can apply and if there is space non-RC children can and do get places. Many Muslims like the ethos of the RC schools and apply for places in them, and there's an RC school in Glasgow which has a Muslim population of somewhere in the region of 85%.

Catholic schools exist to create catholics. It's a far different ethos to cofe schools. After you've read their admissions policy and the oversubscription criteria move on to find the local Diocese schools handbook.

Some religious schools top priority children have attended church or other religious places in order to get in..others it's based on catchment. So you have to look at the individual school's requirements.

You can usually attend and opt out of the religious activities, but consider this carefully. Come Christmas time it's really shit to be the one child opted out of the nativity who just gets to sit at the back of the room and do un fun activities when all the others are dressing up and singing.