What does a Catholic education give a Catholic child?

[wassername]

I am feeling very confused. I am a practising Catholic but converted as an adult so did not attend a Catholic school. My husband is agnostic.

I always thought I would send my children to a Catholic school, but when it came to it, we opted for the nearby non-denominational primary school for various reasons and both my sons are there now, with a daughter likely to follow in 2 years.

The benefit of this choice, as I see it, is a social one. My kids mix with children from many cultures and faiths (we are in Greater London) and I really love the fact that they have this exposure and involvement with the disparate elements of our society.

The school celebrates all faiths - so they mark Christmas and Easter as well as Diwali, Eid etc. However, I wonder if a Catholic education would help them to see how their own faith can be a part of their everyday lives in a way that I think I struggle to do at home.

We attend Mass regularly and the boys attend Saturday morning religious classes at the church. My eldest is in yr3 so is preparing to make his first Holy Communion this year. I think they feel a part af the church community, but I kind of envy the children at the Catholic school who say prayers in the morning and at lunch time and sometimes come to Mass at the church together or have the priest visit the school.

In a couple of years my eldest will be off to High School and I wonder whether I should look at Catholic high schools or continue in the non-denominational sector.

I think my key problem is that essentially I don't like the 'segregation' - ie only mixing with Catholics (at school anyway). Does it give children a different view of others - will they feel a little uncomfortable around people from a different religious and cultural background when they are adults?

I can't help but think that if everyone was educated in schools according to their faith we would have big problems integrating as adults.

I'd really welcome any views!

I don't think that anyone did. We all had to go in one at a time in Sister Genevieve's (the headmistress) office and say if we had done it or not. Then it was announced that anyone could go and see her and confess (that's when the Mary being disappointed bit came in). Next week I am fairly sure it happened again, and then I think we stopped swimming. It's all slightly hazy though, it's about thirty () years ago now.

For any child, it gives them exposure to Christian values (eg love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control). They get exposure to the rhythm of life via the church year, and have regular opportunities for prayer and praise.

For a Catholic child, they get to celebrate Mass.

What does a Catholic education give a child?

Where we live better gcse results

Did you have pale coloured shirts in a variety of shades?

Sexual guilt, lack of any self esteem, stifling of debate and a kick-start on the road to atheism.

I also squeak and cross the road when I see a nun. But that's not very often these days.

I made the OP on this thread on Sunday and didn't get the chance to check back for replies since Sunday night - so it's really good to see so many contributions.

It's interesting to see comments from people who had a Catholic education which completely turned them away from their faith. I'm not terribly surprised as the traditional education by nuns does sound pretty oppressive and I think I would have reacted the same way. I don't think it's the same now though. I have made a mental note to ask my 18 year old nephew and the 19 year old daughter of a friend (who both went to Catholic high schools) what their veiws on sex are..!

Silverbirch mentioned worrying that her children would feel 'odd' as Catholics living in a small community and not at Catholic school. My kids have Catholic cousins they see fairly often and also go to the Saturday RE classes at the church so I hope they don't feel they are the only Catholic children in the area. But like Silverbirch I wonder if they miss out on the sense of belonging to a church community.

ABetaDad made an interesting observation - as a convert to Catholicism am I thinking about a Catholic education in order to feel accepted? Actually, I wonder if I'm thinking I should consider a Catholic education because it's just what you're meant to do when you're Catholic! I don't know any other Catholics who have not sent their children to a Catholic high school (well, actually I do know one whose second child got into a Grammar school so did not follow his brother to the local Catholic high school).

It's very interesting to me that ABetaDad's wife didn't repeat her own Catholic education experience with her children. I feel that we mostly do repeat our own experience - and perhaps that's another issue for me in that I didn't go to a Catholic school so it is a bit of an unknown quantity for me.

The non-Catholic high schools in my area are pretty good and I think if I can help my children to see the good things their faith can give them then perhaps I don't need to send them to a Catholic school. I do want them to actively choose to follow their faith rather than do so blindly because of social pressure, so perhaps they would feel under less duress at a non-Catholic school..?

I thought it must be houses to be honest - did that mean you had to buy new shirts every year? Some of the combinations were quite gruesome. I don't know why girls schools so often pick such unpleasant looking uniforms (is it to try and make the girls so unattractive they don't get approached by any lurking boys I wonder?). The Catholic schools I could have gone to were either kilts or the gruesome brown. Still my sister went to City of London which had a very bright pink look. Lovely

Wassername I think that faith is better explored at home. You never quite now what sort of characters your children may come across at school, and I guess if you send them to a Catholic school then you give the school license to be involved in their spiritual lives. Which is OK so long as you are really sure that the school's views are in synch with yours. Otherwise (and this is a general observation, not limited to faith schools) I think the differences between home and school can cause real problems.

Kilts is standard for catholic schools, not sure why.

Check out this fine outfit from our local Catholic girls' school. Check particularly the white socks.

This is the alternative school -- minus the white socks, mercifully.

Or you can go right to the smartest end of the spectrum. Yup, it's our old friend naff mid-calf length kilts again. There is no escape.

I went to RC schools and the differences to me are:-

1. Its not so weird to go to church on Sunday as it would be at a non-denominational school
2. i know more about the catechism than I would otherwise
3. I am sure I would find being priests and nuns weirder life choices if i had not been in an environment where i at least interacted with them
4. I had friends from school at church things at weekends so i was (marginally) more likely to join in - still didn't like it though
5. I had almost no understanding of other religions as a young adult and what I did learn at a school was taught as the differences. I did have a better understanding of Catholicism than I would have otherwise
6. A Rc education normalised, first communion, confirmation etc and made it a big deal rather than something that i am sure i'd have hidden whilst trying to fit in with the other teenagers at a non-denom school.

There were disadvantages though and for these reasons alone I would not allow my children to go to a segregated school:-

1. No friends around in the summer holiday
2. I didn't know the local children to play with in the evenings.

So i was lonely sometimes and missed chunks of my child hood which i won't get another chance at. (plus in the end it didn't help me stay a practising catholic anyway)

Eeek, frogs, I went there. Before the kilts and white socks though. In my day it was bottle green tunics (skirts for older girls) and beige socks.

Just clicking on that link makes me shudder.

Did they have scary Sr T in those days, Moomin? She scared the bejasus out of me at the open day, v. relieved my dd's didn't end up going there.

Oh frogs this is so long ago. In my day it was scary Sr MR, and a whole host of veiled underlings.

They were ALL scary and some of them were racist - in the sense of their attitudes had been formed in the 1950s and stuck there.

It is very unfair of me, so many years have passed and so much must have changed, but I would never dream of sending the DD there.

Not that there would be any chance - what with her never having been baptised, and having been born four years before her parents got married...in a registry office!

I came from an Anglo Catholic family, went to an evangelical happy clappy state primary and then to an independent Rc convent day/boarding school. Unsurprisingly I have turned out to be an agnostic; but with a belief that there are values in religion which secularism is at risk of losing.

I loved my catholic school.

1. It was so much less materialistic: no one sneered at second hand bicycles or clothes

2.It was a real community: everyone, from the headmistress to the cleaners and the "rescued" alcoholic gardeners was treated as an important person. 3I was never made to feel an outsider because I was not RC. By contrast, it made my forced church attendance on Sundays less freaky 4 I was taught about sex almost entirely by reference to Rhododendron flowers and, in consequence, think all sexual activity other than pollination a bit strange. I think that this has changed and that they do get some broader instruction.

1. When the head girl got pregnant,the school did not expel her: the parents withdrew her and the school sent staff to her house so that she could keep up and take her A levels
2. It taught me that being a bit different is fine and that it's fine for other people to be different as well.
3. I'm 43 and still friends with some of the epople who taught me in the sixth form

Whilst I think that some Catholic schools in the past were terrible, sadistic places, I think that they are now some of the most genuinely humane around

All I know about Catholic schools where I live is they are easier to get into for Catholics (even non-practising one) than the CofE ones. The difference appears to be that the school decides on admissions for the Catholic schools but the LEA decides for the CofE schools. Not sure I understand why.