Way to go ....I like this.

This is one sure  way for young non-Christian immigrants to get assimilated and integrated with the inhabitants of their new country. It's refreshing that the Globe & Mail has this story and I look forward to many more of similar nature.... but somehow I got a feeling they have an ulterior motive for this piece. But never mind.

The young Muslim student reminded me of my own Muslim schoolmates when I was around her age and they would tag along with the other Catholic girls to attend mass, sing the hymns and share the prayer books. Many even wanted to queue up for the Holy Eucharist but the nuns would keep a strict look-out to make sure they refrained from doing so. 

...Mr. Oumer’s 16-year-old daughter, Daliya, has been attending Catholic religion classes at Cardinal Ambrozic Catholic Secondary School in Brampton, Ont., for two years.

“I find it very interesting, I like getting an idea of how our religions are very similar,” she said.

Ms. Oumer feels comfortable using the chapel whenever she needs to pray. The only time she feels a little awkward is on special occasions such as Christmas, Easter or Remembrance Day, when the school attends Mass, and she’s left alone in a pew while her classmates line up to take the Holy Eucharist.

“They suggest that non-Catholics go up for a blessing, but I don’t know, I don’t want to do that,” she said. “So I sit down and everyone’s like, ‘Why aren’t you going up?’ I tell them I just don’t want to.”

Though at least one parent must be Catholic in order for a student to enroll in a Catholic elementary school, at the high-school level faith doesn’t matter as long as there’s room. Declining high school enrolment has meant that there often is room – about 10 per cent of the pupils attending Catholic boards in the Greater Toronto Area are non-Catholic.....