A Catholic School in Every Way - Official

A fictional account carries many truths. See how many truths you can find in this response to a Catholic School Inspection experience.

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The three boys waited until the duty teacher passed their table before continuing their conversation.

‘Does it mean we are all real holy?’

Michael, the smaller of the three, stopped pushing the mixed vegetables around his plate. ‘What makes you think that, Johnoh?’

‘Like the head said, we passed the inspection. It was an RE inspection by some bloke from a diocese, so that must make us holy.’

‘One was a woman,’ the third boy said.

Johnoh and Michael looked at him, surprised he had stopped eating long enough to say something.

‘How could you tell?’ Michael asked him.

‘She sat next to me in one lesson. I could tell by her smell.’

‘Perfume?’

‘No, underarm sweat. My sister smells like that all the time. That’s how I know if it’s a woman,’ Bede answered.

The other two boys sat still, looking at Bede, now shovelling food into this mouth as if in a hurry to clear his plate before someone stole it.

‘Underarm sweat?’ Michael prompted.

Bede nodded. ‘Tell it anywhere.’

Michael frowned in a perplexed way. ‘It’s not the best way to tell a woman.’

‘These days it is,’ Bede answered through a full mouth. ‘Man living down the road from us, fat one, little, wears his wife’s dresses when walking their dog. Can’t fool me. I smell him a mile off. Know he is a bloke. They smell different.’

Johnoh caught Michael’s eye and shrugged as if to say, leave him to his food.

‘The head was pleased that we passed,’ Michael said.

‘More, relieved,’ Johnoh added. ‘Imagine if we had failed.’

Michael frowned at him. ‘How can a Catholic school fail an RE inspection? Catholics invented religion, so we are bound to be the best at it.’

‘Like football,’ Bede said, sucking on the bone he had found on his plate.

‘What is?’ Johnoh asked.

‘Catholics inventing religion,’ Bede said as he tackled the bone. ‘Just like we invented football in England. Makes us best in the world.’

‘No, we aren’t,’ Johnoh said. ‘Everybody beats us.’

Bede waved the bare bone at Johnoh. ‘Only cos we let them. Makes them feel better about not being English like us.’

‘You talk some rubbish,’ Michael said.

‘Telling you the facts. Are you eating those vegetables?’ Bede asked, pointing at the mixed vegetables Michael had been pushing around his plate.

Michael shoved the plate towards Bede. He took the whole plate and handed over his empty plate as a swop.

‘I don’t know how you eat that slop,’ Johnoh said as he stared at Bede, now wolfing down the food from Michael’s plate.

‘Growing boy. Need fuel to grow,’ Bede spluttered through a full mouth.

‘Do you not get fed at home?’ Johnoh asked

‘Not enough,’ Bede answered.

Michael turned sideways to the table to face Johnoh. ‘How can the inspectors tell we are a real Catholic school?’

‘Name on the sign at the gate,’ Johnoh said. ‘St Mary’s, that’s a proper Catholic name for a Catholic school, because we call our school after a saint called Mary.’

‘Has to be more than that.’

‘Such as?’ Johnoh answered.

‘We say prayers.’

‘So do MPs at the start of the day in Parliament. That doesn’t make Parliament a good Catholic school.’

Michael nodded in agreement with this observation. ‘Was it the crucifix hanging in the front entrance?’

Johnoh shook his head. ‘That went up only the Monday before the inspectors came.’ 

‘Maybe they saw the vicar wandering around,’ Bede said.

‘Bede, stick to eating,’ Johnoh said. ‘No vicar comes in here. It’s a Catholic school. We only let in priests.’

‘All the same.’

‘No, they aren’t,’ Johnoh snapped at Bede.

‘What’s the difference?’ Bede asked.

‘One is a priest, the other is only a vicar,’ Johnoh answered. ‘Priests wear black clothes. Vicars go for greys and wear cardigans.’

‘And they have wives,’ Michael added.

‘Who?’ Bede asked.

‘Vicars do,’ Johnoh said. ‘They can marry women called vicar’s wives. That’s what they call them, vicar’s wives. They are special women who only marry vicars.’

‘What do they smell like?’ Bede asked.

‘I don’t know. I haven’t been that near to smell them.’

‘It could have been the RE teacher that got us the proper result in our inspection,’ Michael said, butting in. ‘He goes on in RE lessons about religion, and stuff to do with a Church, and sinning and dying and going to hell.’

Johnoh nodded in agreement. ‘That’s his job. RE teachers are supposed to rabbit on about things like that.’

‘I like his lesson,’ Bede interrupted once more, to the surprise of the two boys with him. ‘Our bottom set winds him up in lessons when Smutty Blake objects to everything the teacher says. Smutty says his dad said it is all a load of cobblers. Except Smutty said the word sh**e like his dad did, not cobblers. He doesn’t say it anymore after that time cos he got three lunchtime and two after school detentions for saying ‘sh**e’ out loud in a lesson. Especially the RE lesson.’

‘Maybe that’s why we passed,’ Johnoh said. ‘None of the teachers swear at us in lessons. They don’t allow no kids to swear out loud if the teachers can hear them.’

Michael shook his head. ‘Has to be more than that. Lots of schools don’t like kids swearing at teachers. I think we passed because none of the inspectors found any kids doing sins and dying and going to hell.’

Johnoh pushed his plate, still holding most of his lunch, towards Bede. ‘What sins could you do in here?’

Michael shrugged. ‘I dunno. The RE teacher goes on about fornication, adultery, coveting wives, murdering people you don’t like and bearing a false witness.’

Bede stopped eating for a moment. ‘Do they do that?’

‘What?’ Michael asked.

‘Strip false witnesses bare and make them tell the truth when they are in court?’

‘Don’t be daft,’ Johnoh said, ‘not that kind of making bare, but more to do with stripping away their lies about what we know they did.’

‘What is fornication?’ Bede asked. ‘We ain’t done that in our RE lessons. Smutty Blake butting in means we get nothing done.’

‘What’s covet of a wife?’ Johnoh asked Michael.

He shrugged after a moment. ‘I’m not sure. Maybe it’s stuff you do when you get older and you don’t get any sex.’

‘Can’t be right,’ Johnoh said. ‘We don’t get sex, but we don’t covet no wives.’

‘Cos they smell too much,’ Bede answered. ‘Do you think the witch at the servery will give me seconds if I say I am from some third world country and I want to send food to my starving family at home?’

The other boys ignored him as he stood and looked at the surrounding tables, searching for leftovers and trying to identify any pupil who looked anorexic, or seemed to be a slow eater who could be helped by Bede taking their plate off them.

‘We could always ask the head what is a Catholic school and how the inspectors knew we were good at it,’ Michael said.

‘How would he know? He doesn’t teach RE,’ Johnoh answered.

‘That’s it,’ Michael cried with delight at having found the answer. ‘I bet the head is a Catholic, and we are a holy Catholic school ‘cos we got a head who is a Catholic and knows about Catholic things. He is always going on about stuff in assemblies and he doesn’t teach RE, so he says Catholic things. That made us pass as a proper Catholic school.’ Michael paused as he thought through his answer. ‘In that case, wouldn’t you think he would tell the rest of us what it means to be a Catholic school and how to act like it in inspections so that we know what we are at and can do well the next time?’

‘Are they coming again?’ Johnoh said in dismay.

‘Maybe in a few years, but we won’t be here, so it doesn’t make any difference to us.’

‘Will the kids then be as holy as we are?’

‘Hard to tell,’ Michael answered. ‘That’ll be up to them and whoever the head is. They will have to make sure they got a headteacher who is a Catholic and knows about Catholic stuff so they can pass their inspection, like we did.’

‘Would he tell the kids what is a Catholic school?’ Johnoh asked.

‘Why would he waste time doing that? We don’t know what it is, and we passed.’

‘He might buy another crucifix for the other entrance to the school.’

‘That would be over the top. The inspectors might think we were just pretending and acting up.’ Bede said. ‘I’m looking forward to telling my grandmother that the inspectors said we are a load of holy kids in a proper Catholic school cos she is always saying I am a sinful, greedy little gut-bag who thinks of nothing, only my belly.’

Michael winked at Johnoh. ‘I wonder where she got that idea.’

© Ted Dunphy

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Disclaimer

I am not connected with the Birmingham Diocesan Education Service or the Catholic Education Service. Views expressed here are my own and are based on experience, research and evidence. 

My experience comes from teaching in and working with Catholic schools in many dioceses around England over many years.

The research investigated the best and the worst Catholic school websites in countries around the world, but especially in England.

An evidence-based approach challenges and refines the learning from the experience and the research.

I support Pope Francis’ concept of synodality. You are welcome to have your say. I listen.

Ted Dunphy

edwarddunphy1@mac.com

Tel: 44 (0) 1527 894659

Mobile: 44 (0) 7891 179180

www.schoolwebsitewriting.com