ABSTRACT
This chapter opens up a dialogue between Grace, a sociologist, and the author, who is a theologian, over the meaning of spiritual capital in relation to Catholic education. The insights that theology could contribute to Grace’s notion of ‘spiritual capital’ are explored. This involves drawing out the possible interconnections between charism within St Paul’s letters and the notion of spiritual capital. The theology of charism is considered, as a way of exploring the theological richness of the notion of spiritual capital. This can help to enrich or reframe the question of what determines the catholicity of a school. The question becomes: is it organisation and ethos which guarantees the quality of relations within the community? Similarly, is it to do with how decisions are made? How is the differentiated participation of each individual in the common project promoted? How is the commitment and authority of each individual regulated? The dialogue is drawn to a close by recognising how various Religious Congregations have been successful at transmitting spiritual capital, and it is suggested that this is because they have drawn on the charism of their original founder, finding a way of keeping it alive.
