‘Religious’ and ‘spiritual’ capitals: the experience of the celebration of Mass in the English Catholic secondary school

Abstract

One of the many challenges that English Catholic secondary schools face in an increasingly secular and plural society is to maintain the Catholicity of their schools. The celebration of Mass in school may function as a means of maintaining the memory of the Catholic faith tradition. In this article the experience of Mass in school is examined through the lens of religious and spiritual capital; the data for analysis were generated in an in-depth ethnographic study of English Catholic secondary schools. The findings suggest that religious capital is diminishing within Catholic schools and the concept of spiritual capital is more relevant to an understanding of the experiences of the students and staff in these schools. There are implications here both for the connection between the Catholic Church and the Catholic school, and for the role of the Catholic school in generating, or maintaining the memory of the Catholic faith tradition.