Why do we send our children to Catholic schools? Many secularists have very fixed ideas about this, which can be summed up by the words “discipline” and “results”. I feel as though I have spent a lifetime responding, “No, it’s the Catholic ethos,” and, of course, then being challenged to define Catholic ethos.It’s still a tough one. Catholic ethos is notoriously hard for us to pin down, but the level of prejudice and ignorance about what goes on in Catholic classrooms amongst outsiders is dizzying. There are plenty of otherwise intelligent folk who believe our children spend their schooldays being taught about the evils of abortion and homosexuality by a band of bewimpled nuns who then march them into the chapel for benediction. One of the p