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Toronto Priest Disturbed by 'Gay Speak' Seminar For Catholic School Teachers And Support Staff

TORONTO, August 7, 2003 (LifeSiteNews.com) - One of the major reasons that Canadian opinion polls can show a surprisingly large percentage of Catholics to be in favour of homosexual 'marriage' is that the Catholic education system has for decades been heavily influenced by teacher and staff resource people who dissent from Catholic moral teaching. On the homosexual issue, therefore, most Catholic students over the past four or five generations have received very poor, if any, well-presented education on their faith's actual teachings on the issue.

Fr. Jim McManamy, of Precious Blood Parish in Scarborough, recently saw first-hand how the church's teachings are skillfully undermined by well-degreed teacher workshop presenters who dish out what he called "gay speak' in the false guise of giving authentic Christian moral principles.

He attended a meeting of Catholic support professionals and teachers from Toronto and surrounding regions that dealt with "gay" youth in Catholic schools. The session was given under the auspices of a "union organization" called the Association of Professional Student Services Personnel. Featured speakers were Dr. Moira McQueen, a moral theologian from St. Michael's College and a frequent presenter to Catholic teachers and trustees and Fr. Ron Mercier, a Jesuit priest and former dean of Regis College University of Toronto

Fr. McManamy wrote a column of his experience for the July issue of Catholic Insight magazine. In the article he writes that "Under the guise of being more sensitive to 'gay' youth in the school context, this meeting was nothing more than a front to promote the homosexual agenda and lifestyle".

Of Dr. McQueen he writes, "Her supposedly erudite, theological presentation seemed to be skillfully designed to confuse weak or poorly formed Catholic listeners and to sow a ton of doubt about the validity of unchangeable Catholic moral teachings".

McManamy also notes that Fr. Mercier "claims that Catholic moral teaching has shifted since the 1975 Vatican document On Certain Questions Concerning Sexual Ethics. The end result is that homosexuality is supposedly no longer seen as a moral category or 'problem'."

The session ended with some comments by proudly gay Catholic school psychological consultant Ed Remming demeaning those who followed the "cookbook morality" of deferring to the catechism and Church doctrine. McManamy writes the Remming went "so far as to say that those who didn't see this wisdom had 'arrested development' and needed psychological help".

Fr. McManamy concludes his article stating "we cannot help but wonder whether this meeting (and a similar one on May 26th held just for teachers) was about helping youth, or about presenting homosexuality as 'normative' and acceptable. Perhaps it was not accidental that this session took place during Toronto's 'Gay Pride Week'".

See the complete Catholic Insight article by Fr. McManamy at
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2003/aug/030807a.html

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