Our History

St Thomas The Apostle College has been serving the community of Peckham since 1965. Since that time it has been an integral part of the local community. In the 1960s the Catholic community in Southwark was growing, so a new school was badly needed in order to provide a quality Catholic education to young Catholic men.

Our school now reflects the multi-faith community in which we live. We have members of our community from a wide variety of faith positions, and we ensure that each is valued equally, in accordance with our Catholic Christian faith. As Catholics we believe that the first of all Human Rights is the right for the individually to freely choose and practice their religion, because it is this choice that relates closest to God.

Our name is taken from the Saint who many of us call Doubting Thomas because he refused to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead until he saw Him with his own eyes. We believe that the story of St Thomas provides strength to all of us. It shows us that we can all have our moments of doubt but that God does not abandon us just as he didn’t abandon Thomas. We can also learn from Thomas’ reaction when he saw Jesus. Thomas was confronted with Jesus’ wounds, his brokenness, but where many of us might have seen pain and agony, where many of us might have recoiled at the sight of open wounds, Thomas saw beauty, the beauty of Christ. He was liberated by his encounter with Jesus. We look to St Thomas as our role-model and we ask him to pray for us so that we might see the beauty of Christ in our broken world, that we might recognise him and say:

“Dominus Meus Deus Meus”

My Lord and My God.