During a reconciliation (confession) session in the school chapel, my character asks the priest (a young priest-in-residence from South America) what she should do when people tease her for being religious. The priest replies... what?
You see, I've never actually participated in reconciliation, even though I did attend Catholic school for nine years, because my family raised us as atheists. During reconciliation, the non-religious girls would go up, explain that they weren't baptised, get the verbal approximation of a fond pat on the head, and be sent back to their seats. (Also, there were no confessional booths, and therefore, none in my story - the priest sits in a chair beside the altar, and the girls are called up one by one to talk with him.)
What might a priest say to a Catholic girl at a Catholic school who is being teased about her religion? Could there be a particular Bible verse or story he might quote (if they generally do that during reconciliation)? My character is reasonably familiar with this priest from services outside of school (in fact, he greets her by saying, "We missed you at services on Sunday!", she replies that her family went to a church up in the city for Mass and then out for brunch afterward).
I've Googled "bullying," "religious bullying," "atheist bullying," "bullied for being religious" and "catholic bullied at school," without a great deal of success.
