Excerpt

“Well, I’m not surprised,” he said, blandly. “He’s quite an astute lad.”
Sister Assunta snarled politely at the beefy male who had so cavalierly brushed aside her indictment. Her eyes narrowed and her thin upper lip curled away from sharp little teeth. She looked away and managed to smooth her grimace into a smile before she spoke.
“There is no question that he is one of our brightest charges,” she said, acidly. “That is not the point.”
“It may be exactly the point, Sister. Intelligent, gifted students can be difficult. But we must encourage independence of mind and a questioning attitude. In grade three, after one of my weekly religion classes, Mr. Salerno wanted to know if it were true that the Catholic Mass always conveys the same spiritual benefits, wherever and whenever it is performed. I assured him that, indeed, this was the case. He then asked why he was told it had been sinful for him to attend the eleven o’clock mass with his grandfather instead of the nine o’clock children’s mass. Quite a neat little trap, don’t you agree? Anyway, I had to explain that he had not committed the sin of missing mass, but had only committed the less serious one of disobeying a school regulation. I said we had taken some trouble to set aside that hour so that we could focus specifically on the spiritual needs of youngsters. He said he could understand that, but added with the most disarming sincerity, ‘I thought the sermon at the later mass was more interesting.’ I had to admit, though I did not say so, that it had been more interesting for me as well.”
Sister Assunta did not share Father Rackley’s amusement.
“That’s a perfect example of disruptive behaviour. It would encourage the other children to ignore the nine o’clock rule and create unnecessary confusion on a matter we have taken great pains to clarify.”
Mother Superior cleared her throat and they both turned toward her, feeling at once the force of her quiet seriousness. Though she was past seventy, she had the face of a child, perfectly open, and perfectly proportioned like a Del Sarto Madonna or one of the saintly faces in Botticelli’s The Virgin Enthroned. There were traces of humour around the edges of her mouth that disappeared when she spoke.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1926763157