Our Logo

Our school logo displays the keys of St Peter as we are in the parish of St Peter, Great Berkhamsted.

Our logo shows two crossed keys representing the keys to the office of St Peter or the keys to the kingdom of Heaven which Christ promised by divine authority to Peter.

Behold he [Peter] received the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the power of binding and loosing is committed to him, the care of the whole Church and its government is given to him.

(St Gregory in his letter to the Emperor Maurice, after quoting Christ’s words in Matthew 16:18-19)

Saint Peter is often depicted in paintings and other artwork as holding a key or a set of keys.

Who was Saint Peter?

Peter was a fisherman who lived near the Sea of Galilee. Being a fisherman was a lot of hard work because they used big nets to pull in fish from the sea. Peter lived a very long time ago. In fact, he lived in the very first century - about 2000 years ago!

How do we know about Peter? He was written about in all four Gospel books of the Bible. Often a historical account of someone or something might only have one source, but here we have at least four: the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

What was he known for?

Peter was among the first disciples of Jesus. All four Gospels tell a similar story of when Jesus saw Peter and his brother Andrew fishing and he told them to, "Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men." That was the beginning of a whole different life for Peter! For one thing, Jesus gave him the new name: 'Peter' (or Cephas), which means 'rock'. The name his parents gave him was actually Simon, so he was sometimes called Simon Peter.

As a disciple, he is remembered for some major events. One of the big ones, according to the Bible, is that Peter out of all the disciples correctly identified who Jesus was. When Jesus asked, "Who do you say I am?", He was pleased when Peter responded, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."

Peter is also known as the foundation of the Christian church. A foundation is the solid part of a building that holds it up from the ground. Back then a foundation would have been made of rocks, just like Peter's name!

His feast day is 29th June.