A Public School Girl in a Catholic School World

I’m preparing to teach in a Catholic school, and boy, I don’t think I’m ready for all that a Catholic school entails. For example, I still can’t see look at our religion books without that superior puffing of the chest feeling – “What is THAT doing here? THAT can’t be here! Whatever happened to the separation of church and state?!” – and then I realize in this new world, state is nothing and church is everything. It’s not that I don’t like Catholicism, granted I have my issues with it, but I think every person that grew up forced to go to church every Sunday share my issues. I even went to a Jesuit college where I roomed with my favorite Catholic school graduate. Let me tell you, Catholic school graduates like Kim where in high demand when theology homework came around. I like the idea of leading a moral life and all of that Sunday School be nice to your friends and visit the elderly neighbor talk, what I don’t like are sentences like this one found in my new teacher packet, “May Jesus, Mary, and Joseph our ‘model teachers,’ bless you and your work in the vineyard of the Archdiocese of Boston.” Number one, they missed a comma after Joseph and I’m not okay with that especially since later in the packet they stress the importance of all speech and writing being grammatically correct. But even more disturbing: who compares a school system to a vineyard? Can you imagine if the Milwaukee new teacher packet used this same format, “May George Bush and his cronies our ‘model teachers,’ bless you and your work in the brewing company of Milwaukee Public Schools.”? Come on, only a Catholic school can get away with that. Even Boston Public Schools would sue the District, saying that quote led to increased wine consumption among first grade students. I’m in a whole new world, and this one definitely doesn’t involve flying carpets and genies.