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TORONTO, December 20, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) — A parental rights advocacy group is claiming victory after an Ontario Catholic school board postponed a visit by a blatantly pro-homosexual activist group to one of its elementary schools.

Parents As First Educators (PAFE) mobilized supporters to call the principal of St. Anthony of Padua Elementary School in the York Catholic school board after learning earlier this month the group Get REAL was presenting Monday.

Get REAL describes itself as “a Canadian non-profit focused on combatting 2SLGBTQ+ discrimination and promoting acceptance in schools, summer camps, and workplaces,” and gives presentations in schools to Grades 4 to 12, noted executive director Teresa Pierre on the PAFE website. 

The activist group visited Father Michael Goetz Catholic Secondary School in the Dufferin Peel Catholic District School board November 14, where presenters “included a lesbian and a transgender male called Jonas,” she said.

“They both stated that in their childhoods, they were interested in, and performed, activities associated with the other gender. The lesbian said that she preferred doing things with the boys and that only in university did she realize she was a lesbian,” wrote Pierre.

“Jonas said that as a child he always felt uncomfortable in his own skin but could not understand why. After their presentations the speakers took questions from students,” she said.

PAFE also asked supporters to write the chair of the trustees of both York and Dufferin Peel Catholic school boards “and say that the board is failing to support Catholic teachings by allowing gender identity theory to be presented in schools,” Pierre said.

“Remind them that a recent statement from the Archdiocese of Toronto states that Catholics can never endorse such gender theory. Catholics must reject the view of the person that underlies terms such as gender identity since that view ‘is not compatible with our faith,’” she wrote.

Pierre reported Wednesday that the December 17 Get REAL presentation at St. Anthony of Padua Elementary School has been postponed until at least after Christmas.

“Many thanks to all who contacted the principal and school board with your concerns that no gender ideology should be presented to students.  Your efforts paid off in spades!” she wrote.

“This is what can happen when parents and concerned citizens work together to protect students!”  

However, she urged parents to continue monitoring the situation in January.

School board director of education Ab Falconi “said senior staff would be looking at Get REAL and the presentation in the new year” and that “if a presentation on LGBT themes is approved, it would respect Catholic teachings on sexuality and not contain any gender ideology,” she wrote.

PAFE also mobilized supporters to protest the Waterloo Catholic District School Board’s (WCDSB) December 6 “spiritual development day” for teachers that included a presentation from LGBT activist Kevin Welbes Godin, and the LGBTQactivist group “Unlearn.”

In that case, it was to no avail.

WCDSB’s director of education Loretta Notten responded to those who raised concerns by assuring them that “there is nothing that will be covered that is contrary to Catholic teaching.”

Pierre reported after the seminar that Welbes-Godin and a co-presenter discussed the “Genderbread person” resource which “explains how gender ideology works” and “proposes that we construct our gender identity in our heads and that gender is not binary.” 

The Genderbread person resource “is opposed to Catholic teaching, which teaches that there are two sexes, and that we cannot reduce the human person to solely our sexual attractions and feelings,” she noted.

They also distributed the pro-homosexual “marriage” children’s book Worm Loves Worm, which includes this excerpt:

WHEN A WORM meets a special worm and they fall in love, you know what happens next. They get married! But their friends want to know—who will wear the dress? And who will wear the tux? The answer is: it doesn’t matter. Because Worm loves Worm. 

Since WCDSB director Notten had been given “ample evidence” beforehand that the workshop “would go off the rails,” it must be concluded she “approved of the resources being distributed,” Pierre noted.

LifeSiteNews contacted Notten to ask if she was still asserting that “nothing that is contrary to Catholic teaching” was covered in the workshop, but received no response.

The York and Dufferin-Peel Catholic school boards are under Toronto’s Cardinal Thomas Collins, and the Waterloo Catholic school under Hamilton’s Bishop Douglas Crosby.

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