WOONSOCKET, Rhode Island, March 10, 2016 (LifeSiteNews) – The Rhode Island Catholic prep school that faced social media backlash for establishing a guideline against admitting transgender students has eliminated the policy.
Mount Saint Charles Academy (MSC) in Woonsocket was the subject of criticism after the prohibition on enrolling students with gender dysphoria was discovered last week.
The 2015-2016 edition of the school handbook had stated the school was “unable to make accommodations for transgender students. Therefore, MSC does not accept transgender students nor is MSC able to continue to enroll students who identify as transgender.”
That link on the school website has been replaced with a PDF file identified as the 2016-2017 handbook, which has no reference to transgender students.
The change was carried out by the Mount Saint Charles Board, according to golocalprov.com.
LifeSiteNews inquired with Mount Saint Charles President Herve Richer for comment on the removal of the policy, but had not heard back by press time.
The regulation against admitting students identifying as transgender had been in effect at the Catholic school since October of last year, only recently coming to light.
Some alumni protested, calling the handbook language “hateful,” and saying the policy goes against the Catholic school’s own teaching.
A Change.org petition was set up in opposition to the policy by one alumnus, and a GoFundMe account put in place to solicit funds for the school to institute the “proper facilities” to accept transgender students.
A March 4 statement from the school on the policy prohibiting admission of transgender students remained on its homepage Thursday, saying the school regrets “unintended hurt feelings and seeming insensitivity” from the policy, and that it was not intended to be discriminatory.
So-called “bathroom bill” policies and legislation have arisen the last several years as gender ideology advocates push to compel schools and municipalities across the country to allow individuals suffering with gender dysphoria access to restroom facilities of the opposite gender.
Pope Francis has come out strongly against gender ideology a number of times, particularly in March of last year when he stated, “Gender theory is an error of the human mind that leads to so much confusion. So the family is under attack.”
His predecessor Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI had in his pontificate explained the “profound falsehood” of gender theory.
“When the freedom to be creative becomes the freedom to create oneself, then necessarily the Maker himself is denied and ultimately man too is stripped of his dignity as a creature of God, as the image of God at the core of his being,” Pope Benedict said. “The defence of the family is about man himself. And it becomes clear that when God is denied, human dignity also disappears.”