This thread is about a case where a couple of divorcing parents who were pagans were forbidden from teaching their kid “non-mainstream religious beliefs and rituals.” The reason being that the kid was also being sent to a Catholic school (apparently because the parents thought the local free public school was abysmal), and this would somehow cause emotional problems for the boy.
If you read my reply in that thread, I comment about having personally known of cases where non-Catholic parents had a kid going to a Catholic school. It seems to me the judge took the attitude that for non-Catholic parents to send their kid to a Catholic school seems so whacked that no way could they be competent parents.
Anyone here familiar enough with US Catholic schools that can comment about exactly how rare it is for a non-Catholic student to attend? While I would suspect this is unusual, I wouldn’t have thought it would be astonishingly rare.
Oh, and I also meant to add that I would guess that the percentage per school could vary significantly. In the school I attended from K-6, I was the only Catholic student in my class from first grade onward (it was a Catholic school). The parochial schools I attended for 7-8 and 9-12, there was a much higher percentage of Catholic students.
They are the de facto private schools in the inner city, since nobody can afford the Dalton School or something, and the ratio of non-Catholics in New York City Catholic schools can be 60-70%. Most parents who can scrape together the tuition (and the richer parishes subsidize the poorest ones) will try to send them there to keep them out of unsafe public schools.
This has actually been true for a while; my dad’s Cardinal Hayes class of 1954 had several Jewish boys in it.
Outside the inner cities, my observation is that when it comes to non-public schools, non-denominational ones tend to be scarce, regardless of cost. If the only non-public school within 20 miles is a Catholic one, parents who don’t want to send their kid to public school don’t have much in the way of an alternative.
I don’t know if this is of any use, but I’m not Catholic, my parents are not Catholic (one Jewish, one theist, neither very religious), and I currently attend a Catholic high school. The public schools are too crowded, and living where we do, the only other option is the Catholic school. I know of at least one other girl who is not Catholic, and even one teacher (Christian, but not Catholic).
Curious. According to the link posted earlier, about 1 in 8 students in Catholic schools are non-Catholic. That you know just one other girl that isn’t Catholic implies that such is rare in your school. Is it possible there are a lot more non-Catholic kids in your school and you just don’t realize it? It occurs to me that non-Catholic kids in a Catholic school likely would be inclined to just keep their mouth shut about the fact, rather than broadcast it and thus stand out.
As a non-Catholic who graduated from a Catholic high school, I can state that in my school, about 20% to 30% weren’t Catholic. There was no need for us to hide the fact we weren’t Catholic because it wasn’t a big deal. We still took the same religious courses the Catholic kids did (of which, I did quite well in). When we had a special mass during class time, we just didn’t take communion.
That something like a quarter of all students in your school were non-Catholic would mean that it was such a common thing there would be little reason to hide it. Apparently the4thmooncat is the only other non-Catholic kid she knows of in the Catholic school she goes to. I can easily imagine if there were only a few non-Catholic kids in a school that some might want to hide this fact.
I suppose some might want to hide that fact. But I expect it’s more likely that there’s just no reason for it to come up. I went to a public high school- no reason to hide any religious affiliation. I didn’t know anyone’s religion except for my closest friends and a few who had fairly obvious religious restrictions. (a couple of students wore yarmulkes and there were a few Muslim girls who couldn’t wear shorts for gym) A non-Catholic in a Catholic school wouldn’t be obvious. They would normally be required to attend religion classes and Mass, just like the Catholics. They would even be behaving just like some of the Catholics- the non Catholics might not pray or sing and wouldn’t receive Communion , but plenty of the Catholics also won’t pray or sing or receive communion. About the only way it would be obvious is if a school prepared second graders for their first Communion and a particular second grader wasn’t present at the Mass.
It’s possible that here are other (maybe many other) non-Catholics, in the4thmooncat’s school, and she just doesn’t know them (or know them well enough to know they are non-Catholic), but it is also possible that her school is almost entirely Catholic. That 13.6% is a national figure. The rates vary for the different regions, the rates within each region are different for the elementary schools and the high schools, and I know the individual schools vary- I’ve heard of a few Catholic elementary schools in NYC with almost no Catholic students and I know of one that I’ll bet has virtually all Catholic students.
Where I grew up (fairly small CA town), the Catholic high school was large and had good academics (better than either of the public high schools), and quite a few non-Catholic kids went there for various reasons. I nearly did myself. I don’t know the exact percentage, but I would guess 15%.
Several kids in my Hebrew school class attended various Catholic and other church-run schools (mostly Episcopalian, IIRC), because their own neighborhood schools were so lousy. This was in Los Angeles, California.
The disparities among percentage of non-Catholic students in schools is nearly directly attributable to demographics. In the Rust-Belt, most inner city schools have non-Catholic populations as high as 60% - 70% (with most of the kids being Baptist or A.M.E.), many inner-ring suburbs may have non-Catholic populations higher than 25% for similar reasons, outer suburbs may have non-Catholic populations below 10% (or down to 0%) because the public schools are competent and there is no strong incentive to place kids in “alternative” schools, and finally exurban, rural, and small-town situations can be all over the map, with higher percentages when the local district is failing or lower or non-existent populations if the local schools are in good shape. (All preceding percentages based on vague memories of disparate news stories, diocesan reports, and conversations with parish staffs.)
To what several people have said - it is probably true that there are more non-Catholics in my school than I know. I make no claim to know everyone in my school, or even a good portion. My not being Catholic has never been a problem.
It’s not even discernable from that. Some non-Catholics (including myself, when I’m in the mood) do pray and sing - though the praying is not Catholic - is this making any sense? I’m not very coherent this morning, sorry.
It isn’t even as unusual as I had thought. Making me wonder why the court even thought this was an issue?