I’m not sure who is handling public relations for the York Catholic District School Board, but I’d strongly recommend a career change. Earlier this week, board members voted 6-4 not to fly the Pride flag, and a typically dull meeting became the subject of national and even international discussion. There have been calls for Premier Doug Ford to intervene, but he knows his base well — and while most Tory supporters might be indifferent to all this, the Christian right would be appalled if he tried to change the ruling.
Thing is, it’s all largely symbolic. Canadian Catholics tend to resemble Canadian non-Catholics on the issue of LGBTQ2 equality. In other words, they’re generally progressive. The days of Roman Catholics paying rapt attention to Church teaching are long gone. That also applies to Catholic schools and Catholic teachers.
Flying the Pride flag is extremely mainstream today, and, particularly at schools, it can make a genuine difference. It helps enable young people who are gay or unsure of their sexuality feel accepted and included. That matters deeply. Catholic opponents of the gesture, however, argue that it affirms a lifestyle opposed by their church. That’s a point worth considering.
The Catholic catechism does state that “homosexual acts” are of “grave depravity,” “contrary to natural law,” and “intrinsically disordered.” The language is grimly harsh, and Pope Francis has often contradicted it in his statements. Still, the official position stands. Then there’s the reality. In the 2000 book The Changing Face of the Priesthood, Father Donald Cozzens estimates that as many as 58 per cent of priests are gay — and that the numbers are even higher for younger priests. He, and others writing on the subject, claim that far from all these men are celibate. It may not change the teaching, but it does make the Catholic stance seem somewhat inconsistent, to say the least.
Then there’s the Bible itself. Scripture is unclear about same-sex relationships. The Old Testament mentions them only a handful of times, never refers to lesbianism, and doesn’t use the word “homosexuality,” because it wasn’t coined until the late 19th century. Jesus doesn’t speak of it at all, and when St. Paul condemns certain sexual activities, he’s referring to straight men using boys for sexual gratification — probably during pagan rituals — rather than loving, lasting partnerships between two people made in the image of God. What does permeate the Gospels and the life of Jesus are transforming love, the rejection of judgment, and the inclusion of those previously rejected.
So there’s plenty of room for Christian dissent when it comes to the latest decision — which, through refusal to fly a flag, implies lack of affirmation to an entire group of people guaranteed equality and protection under Canadian law.
This latest controversy is hardly unique: there have been cases of Catholic schools busing students to anti-abortion rallies and refusing to include gender identity and gender expression in their codes of conduct. Tonya Callaghan, a former Catholic-school teacher, wrote in her book Homophobia in the Hallways, “Within Catholic schools, LGBTQ2 students are treated as though they have a disease that must be ‘cured,’ and LGBTQ2 teachers who are not adept at hiding their sexual orientations are sometimes fired from their jobs or, at best, harassed.”
That may not be the case in every school. But it does lead to questions about the public funding of the Catholic system in this province. Its origins are largely noble; it allowed Catholics, a minority who often faced discrimination, to be able to afford to educate their children according to their faith. But in Ontario, the population is now more than 31 per cent Catholic and 21 per cent Protestant; non-Christian religions are growing steadily. The old dynamics of a struggling minority simply no longer exist.
Quebec eliminated its Catholic and Protestant school boards in 1997. In the same year, Newfoundland and Labrador voted in a referendum to stop funding denominational schools. Manitoba stopped funding back in 1890, and because Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, PEI, and British Columbia didn’t have Catholic school systems when they entered Confederation, the constitutional insistence didn’t apply.
So it could be done. Whether it will be — with all the legal, constitutional, and political consequences and complexities — is another issue entirely. There isn’t a Catholic vote as such anymore, and many Catholics wouldn’t oppose an end to separate school funding. But others would, as would the Roman Catholic hierarchy and many Catholic teachers and, presumably, their unions.
An end to the Catholic system would save money, of course — especially at administrative levels where there is obvious duplication — but perhaps less than some assume: the same number of students will require the same number of teachers in the same number of schools. But we can be sure that decisions like that of the York board will only encourage demands to re-address Catholic funding. Eventually, the politicians will have to listen. Good Lord, just fly the flag: for all of the right reasons, and even some of the wrong ones.