What we mean by Equality

At the heart of Catholic education is the Christian vision of the human person. We at St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School believe that the human individual is created ‘in the image of God’ (Genesis 1: 27) and that ‘being in the image of God, the human individual possesses the dignity of a person, who is not just something but someone’ (CCC. 357). ‘We believe each person possesses a basic dignity that comes from God’ and from Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became one of us (John 1: 14) ‘and not from any human quality or accomplishment, not from race, or gender, age or economic status’ (The Common Good in Education, Catholic Education Service, p. 6, 1997).

This Christian vision, derived from Christ, his Church and Scripture, is expressed and explored in the Catholic life of our school and understood as a ‘work of love’ (The Catholic School on the Threshold of the Third Millennium, §15). Through Christ’s command to ‘love one another as I have loved you’ (John 15: 12) we understand equality to mean treating everyone with equal dignity and worth valuing their particular characteristics such as their age, disability, gender, ethnicity, religion or belief, sexual orientation and socio-economic circumstances.

In his teachings and actions, Christ focused on the poor and vulnerable in society and purposely included in his ministry those who were excluded by prejudice and discrimination. Following Christ’s example we further understand that people have different needs, situations and goals and therefore achieving equality requires the removal of discriminatory barriers that limit what people, especially children and young people can do and can be.  We recognise that inequality can be experienced in a variety of ways such as through outcomes, access to services, the degree of independence to make decisions affecting lives and inequality of treatment, including in relation to employment, through direct and indirect discrimination or disadvantage imposed by other individuals, groups, institutions or systems intentionally or inadvertently.