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GAUDETE
TRUST Exercising the educational trusteeship of five Religious Orders

Gaudete Trust

The Gaudete Trust is a collaborative trust exercising the educational trusteeship of five Religious Orders, namely: The Christian Brothers (CFC) Sisters of Charity of St Paul the Apostle (SP) De La Mennais Brothers FICP (Brothers of Christian Instruction) The Faithful Companions of Jesus (FCJ) The Congregation of La Sainte Union (LSU) The mainspring of the Trust is the desire of Religious Orders to continue to put their charisms at the service of the Church. By adopting a collaborative approach to trusteeship, the Gaudete Trust offers those Religious Orders an alternative way of continuing to serve Catholic education. The Trust is a legal entity with the authority to take on those legal, financial, and inspirational responsibilities of educational trusteeship that were formerly exercised by these individual Religious Orders. It is a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) recognised by the Charity Commission and a Public Juridic Person recognised by the Catholic Church.

Our Members

The Trust has six members, five appointed by the founding religious orders and an episcopal member appointed by the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales. The Founding Members are:

Therese Browne SP
Brid Liston FCJ
Dominic Sassi CFC
Jim Hayes FICP
Margaret O’Reilly LSU
Alan Williams SM (Episcopal Member)

To date the Members have appointed five Charity Trustees and are seeking
to appoint up to 15.

Our Trustees are:

Francis Davis
Roisin Maguire
Maureen Mee
Maura Regan
Brenda Wallace FCJ

Our Schools

Currently our family of schools consists of 16 state funded schools and two independent primaries. This represents up to 20% of Catholic state funded schools under the trusteeship of Religious Orders.

Our Education Office

The Education Office is a vital link between the Trustees and the Schools. Its key responsibility is to support the schools and colleges in the implementation of the shared vision and the honouring of individual charisms. This includes developing resources and arranging and/or contributing to professional development events. It will be staffed by an Education Officer, a Charism Development Officer and an Admin Officer.

Origin

The Gaudete Trust was legally established in 2023 by five Religious Orders, following a four-year collaborative venture steered by a working group of the National Association of Religious Orders in Education (ROE). This venture was part of the latter’s mission to enable the rich heritage of Religious Orders to continue to enrich Catholic education and flowed from its desire to respond creatively to the needs of its members. The Collaborative Trust page

Our Name

Our name – Gaudete – was chosen after much reflection. This collaborative trust is a new venture for Religious Orders in England and Wales, so we wanted a name that makes people stop and think about its meaning.

It is a name that tells us to rejoice!
We rejoice in the Good News of the Gospel.
We rejoice in the Holy Spirit who is enabling us to create something new and is teaching us what true collaboration means.
We rejoice in the rich heritage of Religious Orders in education. But most of all we rejoice in our young people for whom this trust was built, and we want them, as we say in our vision of education, to be able to rejoice in the person they are and so achieve the fulness of life of which Jesus spoke.

The Charter

Vision, Mission, Aims and Guiding Principles

The Gaudete Educational Vision and Philosophy

The Characteristics of The Gaudete Trust’s Education

The Charism Statement of the Religious Orders who belong to the Gaudete Trust

Charter for The Gaudete Trust

Job Application

Details for a new exciting opportunity within the Gaudete Trust.
Gaudete Trust Edu Officer job description
Gaudete Trust Edu Officer application form

 

Forthcoming Events

2 Christian Brothers schools join the Laetare C-Mat

Two Esteemed Christian Brothers Schools Join Laetare Catholic Multi-Academy Trust Date: Monday 2nd June 2025 St Ambrose College, Altrincham, and St Anselm’s College, Birkenhead — two highly respected Catholic Grammar Schools founded by the Congregation of Christian Brothers — have…

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