I attended Catholic schools for 13 years. The last seven were spent at an all-boys school run by priests and brothers. The only female on the staff, except for the cooks, was the school nurse, and even that was a matter of doubt. I did receive what I now recognise to be a lot of ridiculous "education" but I never witnessed or experienced any sexual abuse, nor heard any rumours of it. I went on several school journeys too - no problems. Like most schools there was corporal punishment, in our case allegedly administered via a leather implement of some sort, but it was administered sparsely, never to me, and I never heard reports of bare bottoms. Yet when I visited the school website's message board recently I saw a load of really serious accusations of abuse dating from the time I was there. I couldn't get my head round that.