Two eleven-year-old girls from Ottawa are planning to start a “gay-straight alliance” club at their Catholic elementary school after the Ottawa Catholic School Board recently approved their controversial project on “gay rights” amidst national media coverage.
Homosexual activist Jeremy Dias, founder of Jer’s Vision, who had lunch with the girls after the story hit the headlines, was instrumental in encouraging them to launch the homosexual club, reports the homosexual news service Xtra.
Quinn Maloney-Tavares and Polly Hamilton of Ottawa’s St. George Catholic School hope that successfully recruiting students to form a GSA will be the crown of their “gay rights” project. On top of this, the girls have been invited to participate in an OCSB focus group meeting every two years to monitor the climate of inclusivity and diversity in the board’s schools, one of the girl’s moms told Xtra.
St. George principal Ann Beauchamp had initially told them that the “gay rights” presentation, which the girls said would show why it’s “rude” to “make being gay a bad thing,” was inappropriate given the age of the audience.
The school board backed her decision, but then, amidst front-page coverage from the Ottawa Citizen, CBC, the Ottawa Sun, and other major media, the board reversed its decision.
“The Holy Father, Pope Francis, has made it clear that our attitudes to gay and lesbian people should be addressed with love and dignity in an open and transparent way, when he said, ‘Who am I to judge?’” then-OCSB Chairman Ted Hurley, who recently left the board after choosing not to run in the fall election, said in explaining the decision.
The girls then held another meeting with Beauchamp, where she gave them the go-ahead.
The girls can now do their “project on how the topic of gay rights is addressed by a Catholic high school’s equity club. The girls will be welcome to present their project at the social justice fair,” said Ottawa Catholic School Board (OCSB) spokesperson Mardi de Kemp.
In explaining the board’s decision to approve the project, Director of Education Julian Hanlon pointed to the 2012 document “Respecting Differences.” Published by the Ontario Catholic School Trustees Association, in league with the province’s Catholic bishops, the document established a framework for student-led clubs to combat “bullying” related to racism, gender, disability, and sexual orientation.
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“It’s quite clear in there that Catholic schools do respect and welcome all and are prepared to, if you want to talk about presentations, allow presentations,” he told Ottawa Citizen. “That information is already out there.”
While the Respecting Differences document states that “all activities and organizations should be opened to all students who wish to participate,” it adds to this that such activities “must be respectful of and consistent with Catholic teaching.”
Respecting Difference was put forward by Catholic leadership in 2012 as a response to Bill 13, the McGuinty government’s anti-bullying legislation that forced Catholic schools to launch gay clubs under the name “gay-straight alliances.”
Ontario’s Catholic life-and-family leaders warned before the legislation was passed that capitulation from Catholic leaders to the anti-bullying legislation would only open up the Catholic schools to homosexual activism.
“[McGuinty’s Bill 13 is a] Trojan Horse piece of legislation which pretends to be about bullying in order to sneak a homosexual agenda into the classroom,” said Kim Galvao, head of Concerned Catholic Parents of Ontario (CCPO), at the time.
Correction: We originally identified Ted Hurley as chairman of the Ottawa Catholic School Board, however, by the time of writing Hurley had stepped down as chair and trustee after choosing not to run for re-election this fall.
