The Little Book That Shaped Millions
For over a century, Catholic children across the English-speaking world learned their faith from a small, inexpensive booklet — so cheap it cost a penny, which is how it got its name. The Penny Catechism — formally titled A Catechism of Christian Doctrine — was first published in 1889 by the bishops of England and Wales, and it remained the standard teaching text in Catholic schools and parishes well into the 1960s.
It is a slim thing. Barely fifty pages. No illustrations, no sidebars, no discussion questions. Just 370 questions and answers, arranged in order, covering the whole of Catholic faith from the existence of God to the last things. Its method is ancient: the teacher asks, the student answers. Question by question, line by line, the faith is transmitted.
To modern eyes, this method looks rigid — rote learning, mechanical repetition, no room for exploration. But there is a reason it worked for generations, and a reason many Catholics are rediscovering it today.
Where It Came From
The catechism tradition is as old as the Church herself. The word “catechism” comes from the Greek katechein — to instruct by word of mouth. From the earliest centuries, converts were taught the faith through structured oral instruction before Baptism. The content was organised around the Creed, the sacraments, the commandments, and prayer — the same four pillars that structure every catechism since.
After the Reformation, the Council of Trent commissioned a catechism for parish priests — the Roman Catechism (1566) — to ensure consistent teaching across the Catholic world. Over the following centuries, various national catechisms were produced for popular use: the Baltimore Catechism in the United States, the Maynooth Catechism in Ireland, and the Penny Catechism in England and Wales, which was also widely used in Australia, New Zealand, and other parts of the British Empire.
The Penny Catechism distilled the teaching of these earlier catechisms into the shortest, simplest, most accessible format possible. Every answer was crafted to be memorisable — short enough for a child to learn, precise enough for an adult to rely on.
What It Contains
The Penny Catechism is organised into four main sections, following the traditional structure of catechetical instruction.
Part One: What We Must Believe. This covers the Creed — the existence of God, the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Redemption, the Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. It is a compressed course in theology, moving from God’s nature through salvation history to the last things, in roughly one hundred questions.
Part Two: What We Must Receive. This covers the sacraments — Baptism, Confirmation, the Eucharist, Penance, Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony. Each sacrament is treated in turn: what it is, what it does, what is required to receive it worthily.
Part Three: What We Must Do. This covers the moral life — the Ten Commandments, the precepts of the Church, the virtues, the works of mercy, and the nature of sin. It is the most practical section, dealing with how Catholics are expected to live.
Part Four: What We Must Pray. This covers prayer — what it is, why it matters, and the principal prayers of the Church, including the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Act of Contrition, and the Rosary.
Together, the four sections cover everything a Catholic needs to know to understand, practise, and live the faith. They are not exhaustive — no fifty-page booklet could be — but they are complete. Nothing essential is missing.
The Method: Question and Answer
The question-and-answer format is the Penny Catechism’s most distinctive feature and the source of both its strength and its criticism.
The strength is clarity. Each question isolates a single point of doctrine. Each answer states it precisely, in words chosen for accuracy and memorisability. There is no ambiguity, no fuzziness, no room for confusion. When a child who has learned the Penny Catechism is asked “What is the Blessed Eucharist?” they can answer immediately: “The Blessed Eucharist is the true Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, under the appearances of bread and wine.” That answer is theologically impeccable. It is also unforgettable.
The criticism is that the method can reduce faith to information — facts to be memorised rather than truths to be lived. This is a fair concern. A person who can recite every answer in the Penny Catechism but has never prayed from the heart has learned the words but missed the music.
But the criticism misses something important. You cannot love what you do not know. Before you can have a relationship with God, you need to know who God is, what He has done, and what He asks of you. The Penny Catechism provides that knowledge — clearly, concisely, and accurately. What you do with it afterward is up to you and the Holy Spirit.
How to Use It Today
The Penny Catechism is freely available online and in inexpensive print editions. Here are some ways to use it.
As a personal refresher. Read through it slowly — a few questions a day. You will be surprised how much you have forgotten and how much you never knew. The answers are short enough to read in a minute but deep enough to think about for an hour.
As a family resource. The question-and-answer format is ideal for family use. At dinner, before bed, or on a car journey, ask one question and discuss the answer. Children absorb more than you think, and the habit of talking about faith as a family is worth more than any programme.
As preparation for Confession. Part Three — on the commandments and sin — provides an excellent framework for examining your conscience. Work through the commandments one by one and ask yourself honestly where you have fallen short.
As a companion to the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The CCC is comprehensive but large — over 900 pages. The Penny Catechism gives you the framework; the CCC fills in the detail. Read the Penny Catechism answer first to get the essential point, then turn to the relevant section of the CCC if you want to go deeper.
As a starting point for prayer. Take one answer — any answer — and sit with it. “God is the supreme Spirit, who alone exists of Himself, and is infinite in all perfections.” That single sentence contains enough theology to sustain a lifetime of contemplation. Let the words sink in. Let them lead you into wonder.
The Penny Catechism and the CCC
Some Catholics wonder whether the Penny Catechism has been superseded by the Catechism of the Catholic Church, published in 1992. The answer is no — not in the sense of being replaced, though the CCC is now the authoritative reference text.
The two catechisms serve different purposes. The CCC is a comprehensive reference work — detailed, nuanced, extensively footnoted. It is not designed to be memorised. The Penny Catechism is a teaching tool — concise, memorisable, and designed to be learned by heart.
They complement each other perfectly. The Penny Catechism gives you the skeleton of the faith in a form you can carry in your head. The CCC gives you the flesh, the muscles, and the lifeblood. Both are faithful. Both are useful. Neither replaces the other.
Why It Still Matters
There is something to be said for knowing your faith by heart — not just in the sense of memory but in the deeper sense of having it written on your soul. The generation that learned the Penny Catechism could answer questions about their faith instantly, confidently, and correctly. They might not have been able to explain the theology behind every answer. But they knew what the Church taught, and they knew it in words that stayed with them for life.
We have largely lost this. Many Catholics today cannot explain the Real Presence, cannot name the seven sacraments, cannot state clearly what happens at death. This is not because they are unintelligent. It is because no one taught them — or because what they were taught was vague, experiential, and unmemorable.
The Penny Catechism is a corrective. It is not the only tool, and it is not sufficient on its own. But as a foundation — a clear, concise, accurate statement of what the Catholic Church teaches — it has never been bettered.
A penny was a small price. The return on investment was extraordinary.