It would be presumptuous and delusional of me to expect the Malta Union of Teachers or the General Workers’ Union to put their principles where there words are. But let us, for the sake of argument, kid ourselves into believing that they have it in them to do so.

Therefore, one would expect the GWU to be bold enough to employ as the head honcho of its newspapers a fully qualified and experienced editor – the best that money can buy – but wait for it, one who is also a union basher fanatically exhorting people on Facebook not to enrol in trade unions.

Harbouring the same illusion, one could hallucinate that the teachers’ union would employ as its CEO the best administrator in the country even though in his spare time he campaigns for the end of school summer holidays or for the extension of school hours during winter time.

This would be hara-kiri since the presumption is that the chief editor of the media of the GWU and the CEO of MUT, besides being fully qualified professionally, must also be fully immersed in the ethos of the trade union movement.

Any anti-union life choice by these employees – though they are not elected officials – is tantamount to automatic firing. Elementary, dear Watson, or is it?

It is anything but for the big cheeses at the GWU and the MUT.

They believe (albeit subconsciously) that what is good for the secular goose should not be good for the ecclesiastical gander so much so that they are on the warpath against the Church in Malta.

In a recent statement, the MUT declared breathlessly that the Church is [Oh my! Oh my!] oppressive and wants to drag us back to the Middle Ages. The GWU, not wanting to be outdone by the MUT in its defence (sic!) of the workers, shrilled that the Church was hatching an anti-constitutional plan.

Why this hissy fit?

All the Church is doing is examining how, in like fashion to the MUT and the GWU, the top posts in its schools would be occupied by people who are both professionally competent and similarly imbued with its ethos.

The Church is discussing with, among others, the head of schools, a document about how it can ascertain that people in these posts are both professionally competent and at the same time adopt life choices in line with the teaching of the Church.

It is true that educational standards have gone to the dogs but I never knew things are so bad that MUT president Kevin Bonello, cannot understand a document written in simple English.

In an article written last Wednesday in Times of Malta, Bonello said that the draft consultative document of the Church is built on the assumption that those occupying top posts in Church schools “are living a perfect life as explained by our Lord.”

The draft consultative document says exactly the opposite. On page 18 it states that a “practicing Catholic … will almost certainly not be a perfect Catholic.”

Then Bonello gives us the story of the exemplary teacher who has been abandoned by her husband and is now separated.

He piously asks: “Who are we to condemn her and decide that she is not able to teach values to children just because she is legally separated?”

Before you take out your pitchforks and head to the Curia, please note that there is not even one word in the Church’s draft consultative document which would vaguely or remotely suggest that this person cannot be employed in a Church school.

What is the Church expecting from heads, assistant heads and only staff members “who assist students to address and make substantial life-choices that involve fundamental Catholic values”?

Note that there is no reference to teachers of maths, geography and IVF babies as some media reports wanted us to believe!

The document states that they will be required to accept the following code of conduct:

“That their personal life-choices or circumstances which contrast or run counter to the Catholic ethos of the school remain private and are in no way promoted or openly presented as alternative or acceptable choices.”

“That they actively support and promote the Catholic Ethos of the school and the values upheld by a truly Catholic Education.”

Bonello will not employ union bashers with his union but he wants the Church to employ Church bashers in top positions in its schools

Is that asking too much?

Bonello’s claim that the Church in Malta is dragging us kicking and screaming back to the Middle Ages vanish into thin air when one considers that for several years Church schools in the UK have been – legally and without any problems with the unions – asking from its staff much more than the Church in Malta is proposing.

Bonello should thank his lucky stars that he does not lead a union in Germany whose Federal Constitutional Court has just decreed that a Church hospital was within its right to dismiss a doctor who divorced and remarried! He will not even find comfort in a number of decisions of the European Court of Human Rights!

Bonello will not employ union bashers with his union but he wants the Church to employ Church bashers in top positions in its schools.

That smacks a tad of the adoption of double standards. Or should we just blame it on the use of the English language which is so difficult to decipher in this day and age?

• Last July I wrote about the e-edition of The Maltese Missionary Experience ably penned and published by Maltese missionary Fr John Caruana. The book has now been printed by Gutenberg Press; and what a gem of a book it turned out to be!

The Maltese Missionary Experience has a coffee table format. Its 450 pages are full of unique photos and stories of Maltese missionaries. It will hit the bookshops on Tuesday but will be officially launched on December 29 at 10 am in Sala San Pawl on the first floor, at the Catholic Institute, Floriana.

Those who benefitted from the pre-publication offer can collect their copy on the same day or on Tuesday morning from the Catholic Institute. It would make a nice Christmas present. Well done Fr John.