To think that actually, i am the lesser hypocrite here (church schools, sorry!)

[LucyEllensmummy]

OK so, I have just submitted my application for my DD to go to the local church school. My reasons are as follows. 1. It is BY FAR the best school in the local area. 2. I am a catholic and want my DD to go to a catholic school and three, and possibly the most important reason 3. My father, who died before he met DD would have been thrilled for her to go to that school and have the whole churchy upbrining.

So, here is the difficult bit - I am a lapsed catholic. I did go to church for just over a year when DD was born, but as she got older the services got too much for her. I could have started going by now yes, but i have to tell you - our local priest could BORE for England, most parishoners agree with me. My DP is not catholic, hes atheist. We are not married.

Now, i totally accept that practising catholics are given priority over non practising catholics. I had the choice to go to church every sunday when actually i would rather not, just because i want dd to go the school. I chose not to do this. I think the admissions critirea is that, PRacticing catholics then non practicing catholics, non catholic but attend different church and then non church goers (this alongside catchment area etc).

So, was having conversation with another mum who is non catholic who got quite cross that my DD would take priority over her DD because we are catholic and she is not, even though they go to church - fair enough, but she has made it clear that she "trudges to church every week so she can get her child into the school". As a catholic i think she underestimates the difference between catholic and non catholic christianity, and she is only taking her child to church to get her into the school anyway. Never mind that we can hear the church/school bells from our house which is a 5 minute walk from the school and she lives in the catchment area of a totally fine school, but a 15 minute car journey to the catholic school.

The school does have to take a proportion of non catholics anyway so what her problem is im not really sure...

If you're trudging to church just to send your child to a church school, you're dishonest and confirming to said child that its ok to deceive to get what you want.

And really....isn't it just pissing on those for whom religion is important?

Arf at nametaken! That's pretty much it though -- it isn't that catholics think they're more special than the CoE, they just think that what they have is important. Plus it's what they know and what they're used to. Other religions don't really impinge much, I'm afraid.

It's like speaking English rather than French or Italian -- your own language is the natural medium in which you feel at home, and you don't really need to justify your choice vis a vis all the other languages that are potentially available to you. Italian is all fine and good, and no doubt very nice for italians, but doesn't really affect my relationship with my own language.

You are not being a hypocrite; you want a Catholic education for your child; it is part of your culture, and you have demonstrated your commitment to raising your child as a Catholic by having her baptised. Your school's order of admission seems correct.

Why has this woman not had her child baptised? It suggests to me that she is not that bothered about the Catholic element of the school. It seems very odd; if she is going to turn up at the church every week, why does she not just have a baptism? You don't have to be a Catholic to have your child baptised a Catholic. If she got the child baptised she would presumably be above you on the admissions list. Schools want proof that the child is a baptised Catholic not that the parent is, surely?

I went to a secular school but have very religious parents (1 Catholic, 1 Anglican) and I think people who have not come from a religious background just do not understand how encompassing Catholicism is, and how odd it is to send your child to a Catholic school if you don't really want them to be a Catholic.

Actually I'll modify that last point; I don't know why you would send the to a Catholic school if you don't want them to be religious. There are children of other denominations and religions in Catholic schools because they would rather have Catholicism than no religion in a secular school, and a school of their religion is not available locally.

lol at Custy and nametaken

Rev, as a lapsed hypocrite Catholic, I entirely agree with your post.

Lucyellensmum, just do what you have to do. It's fine - you have your reasons, and most Catholics would think it a good thing that your child was being brought up in the faith even if it's not an option for you to return to it.

As to who is the greater hypocrite, I seem to remember something in the bible about removing the beam from your own eye first so that you might see clearly to deal with the mote in your neighbour's... (ie better to deal with your own conscience before you worry about the other woman's). Good luck with your application.

LEM

I went to the Catholic and Anglican churches on alternate weeks growing up; the services are almost identical. The two churches have the same sacraments and both have deacons, priests and bishops.

The Orthodox church also has all the sacraments.

If you go to the Cof E website you can read an explantion. It describes itself as being 'both catholic and reformed'.

Rev, until I did the Alpha course last year at my local baptist church I had no idea that other religions had communion. Well, the thing is, it's not that I had no idea, it's just that I'd never given it any thought. But why would I?

I thoroughly enjoyed arguing with the Pastor though, he was intelligent and well educated and I had a lot of respect for him.

Anyway, sorry for the hijack LEM.

Lucyellensmummy - which c word? you mean... CONDOMS?

no honestly, i didn't know that, i thought it was just a catholic thing. DD1 went to a cofe school despite being not baptised, I only went to church stuff to do with the school and often thought, oh, i wonder why they don't do communion. So, i have learnt something from this thread.

I have given this a lot of thought tonight. I even started to think i had done the wrong thing by sending DD there. But no, i have made the right decision and will stand by it. I always felt i made a mistake by not sending DD to a catholic school and i let my own bad opinion of myself make that decision. I still have self esteem issues, and no, i don't think they stem from the catholic church - i was very badly bullied at school. But now i know i must do what i think is the best thing for my DD2. I will openly admit that my main motivation is academic and social, but as a parent i am entitled to want the best for my child. So quite clearly, if the catholic school had a poor academic record and the state school and excellent one, id go for the state school - its too important really isn't it to care about who might think i'm a hypocrit - yes, i am, but i think that when im standing at the school gates - i wont be the only one!!!

Whoever said that catholicism is part of my culture is correct, even though i don't go to church, it is part of who i am (quite frankly, whether i want it to be or not).

lol pretty much vez i meant contraception and then there is the tiny issue of mysogeny within the catholic church, but thankfully i don't think (hope) that filters down to primary school!!

The big difference between Catholics and CofE is transubstantiation, ie that as Catholics we believe the bread and wine become the body and blood of Jesus during the Eucharist.

You sound like a great Catholic LucyEllensmummy - full of guilt! My dcs go to a (fantastic) Catholic school and I think 60% of us parents have gone back to church after major lapses to ensure our dcs got a place there.

oh yes that tiny issue - grrrrrrr.
I hope things have changed now, with girls allowed to be altar servers, etc, but I can remember my mind boggling at 7 over all the Virgin Mary hymns we learnt verses and verses of off by heart for the May procession, and thinking long and hard about what "chaste" and "virgin" meant (no idea but they were obviously very important as the key focus of all these hymns) and knowing it was some issue that was bad news for girls in a shameful way I couldn't quite define.

I feel left out not being in the church, and not knowing how to articulate big life events or how to educate my (unborn, bastard) child, but some of it is really pure evil and some of it is plain old made up fairy story bobbins; so given that

a. there is no allowance for personal conscience within Catholicism - you get told what's what and no arguments;
b. no one I consider to be a legitimate representative of me is in a position to negotiate within this hierarchy (being fatally spiritually and intellectually hindered by the absence of a cock)

there is nothing for me to do but skulk off muttering.

Sorry if my last post was offensive to Catholics or to anyone else. I have huge respect and admiration
for many practising Catholics and much of the social stuff that the people within the church do and didn't mean to imply anything against them or anyone else.

rev, you may be right but I was taught that you are given doctrine and have to go along with it. any discussions you have with priests, etc, are framed as you being very kindly given the opportunity to raise things you may not understand. but you do not have the right to disagree, and you can be refused absolution / communion / other sacraments for standing your ground. this is one of the key differences between catholicism and other forms of christianity, including C of E, as I understand it. it makes me sad and angry because without exercising my own conscience I do not consider myself to be fully spiritually human / adult (and therefore not fit to receive sacraments anyway). and if it were the case that - even in theory - i had a chance to engage with doctrine within the hierarchy of the church, or that people I trust were doing so on my behalf (in the way that I can stand for parliament or lobby my MP, but still have to abide by the laws of the land), it might be easier to swallow. but no woman - not a single one - has a say. and probably none ever will.

Again, apologies for going on about this and hi-jacking a completely different thread. This is all at the surface for me at the moment so I am going on too much.

I am off to bed now so no more doom and gloom from me! good night all

Yes, the individual conscience is the court of last resort for Catholics, as it were. The caveat (to make sure that it's not a get-out-of-jail-free card: 'Yes, I murdered my dh, but my conscience said it was okay, so it's not a sin') is that you are expected to inform your conscience along the lines of the church's teaching. So you can't just ignore the bits that don't suit you, which is fair enough I guess.

But you can certainly use your own judgement in deciding how you will act in any given circumstances, and priests accept that, by and large. Go into any family Mass, and see how many families there are with five or more dc -- really not many, even four kids is not that common these days. Priests aren't stupid, they know the reason that even devout and practising catholics don't have 14 children isn't just down to the power of prayer and an ability to count to 28.

Vezzie

you can be denied the sacraments in the C of E due to your beliefs/actions, but the priest has to have the approval of a bishop or archdeacon before denying you.

Sorry LEM for ongoing thread hijack.

LucyEllensmummy -IMO - Church schools best serve people like you and your DD. The school can teach the religion bit where you are "failing". You friend is far more of a hypocirite than you.

I've put a Catholic school as my #2 choice for DD to go to in September. Becuase I'm lazy I didn't get around to it I didn't include her baptism certificate, although I'd written on the form the date and place of her Baptism (which happened to be the church in whch is next to the school, as in the school is in the church grounds). I was a bit when they wrote to aske me to provide a copy of the certificate so tehy could consider her for a place, as my first reaction was "2would I lie about her being Baptised to get her into a church school? ," but then again I guess some peple would. [shrug]

Vezzie, thanks for answering my questions, it does help me understand why catholics don't feel other christians can be Godparents to their children (eg, which confused me).

But, doesn't God love everybody equally? Even if they don't believe in him at all!

But I have a better grasp of why catholics (some) consider their faith like the fast lane to God. It's as though, for we cofE, we've taken our faith down a gear by admitting that the bread and the wine are only a symbol??? To extremely paraphrase (as charlie and Lola might say!).
Sorry for all the car analogies!!!

Nametaken, thanks for the joke, nice to keep these convos light(ish)

rev, lol at wiggle-room.

LEM, I know it's silly of me, and I'm too sensitive and I need to toughen the fcuk up, but because I live in a predominantly catholic country and I'm the 5% minority, I take it all to heart FAR too much when I discover that some catholics still think we're so different that we don't even have communion!! Does that make sense. To me, CofE and Catholicism are in the greater scheme of things so similar you can hardly fit a fag paper between them. All the differences are inserted by MAN. Various, over the centuries.

Liffey, please don't take my ignorance to heart - i guess i didn't know that because i have never bothered to find out, i was quite embarrased about not knowing anyway. I do tend to agree with you that they are much the same, but its funny isn't it that i used to feel more guilty going into CofE churches than not going to church at all. But that is because im weird. I would imagine that most practising catholics know that CofE have communion.

"Go away and examine your concience" is what one particular hard faced nun used to say to us when we were naughty at school . I do seem to remember concience being a big part of the teaching.

Its funny though, because our priest is real old school (and has on more than one occasion has indicated to me that if i was a "proper" catholic i would get married (obviously) and have more children (honestly!!). He is so rigid on things, i often wonder if it is his own concience guiding him, or he is following the rule books when he really wants to say to me - look, you love your DP and you love your child, thats enough for me, and the big man!

Anyway, i MUST not be posting anymore on this thread, as interesting as some of your views are - firstly, i don't know enough to argue and secondly, im supposed to be preparing DPs accounts and time is moving on

I had six god parents, only two of which were catholic. One of them was an irish protestant and im pretty sure she worried about being struck by lightning

Hi Liffey, interesting - what country are you in (if you don't mind saying)?

I think I may be out of date on some things tho (if not strictly doctrinally, which is possible as well, then on how things are actually practised) because reading the posts today it seems to me that lots of people have found more "wiggle room", as they put it, than there ever used to be.

frogs - your post makes complete sense, but I don't know whether times have changed informally (as opposed to when I was at school in the 80s), whether things have actually changed more formally, or whether it's just about it not being possible to boss adults around like children / teenagers. Do you know?

LucyEllensMummy - I would hazard a guess that your priest really believes all that. and your nun at school was so programmed that to say "examine your conscience" was a threat - because her conscience was so perfectly honed to make her feel guilty about everything that she had total confidence that yours would be too!