God’s Story: the Vision, Values and Mission of a Catholic School in the 21st Century
I’ve been busy over the last few months on my non-working days, weekends and bank holidays – basically any spare five minutes I could find outside of the day job – finishing off my new book on the vision, values and mission of a Catholic school in the 21st Century.
I still find many people who are a bit confused in Catholic schools about what is vision and what is mission, and should it be values or virtues, and where do the principles of Catholic Social Teaching fit into all this?
In the book, I’ve suggested a way through this, a template for Catholic schools. The title comes from the new emphasis in the Religious Education Directory on the story of our faith, the story of stories, God’s love story with the world.
Catholic schools form their young people in this story, this vision of the world, and also critique the other stories which have a hold over the imagination of our young people: the story of the consumer age, the story that the earth as a commodity not a gift, that people are dispensable. We offer a life-affirming story to counter these narratives.
The book is divided into six chapters:
1. God’s Story: the story of stories
2. The Story of Catholic education: from 1850 to the present
3. The Atmosphere in a Catholic School: animated by love
4. Reading the Signs of the Times in the 21st Century
5. Embedding God’s Story in a Catholic School
6. Vision, Values and Mission: a model for Catholic schools
The book will be available from Redemptorist Publications in September. Keep an eye on their website for pre-orders and news of publication: https://www.rpbooks.co.uk/
If you’re interested in booking me to come to your school or CMAT to work with you on vision, values and mission: please get in touch.