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LGBTQ Safety or Religions Liberty

Last year the Ontario legislature mandated that all schools, religious or otherwise establish Gay-Straight Alliances, groups where gay students could gather to talk about their issues. This is an attempt to prevent bullying. The Roman Catholic church, that operates schools of course saw this as a threat to their religious liberty.

In an article in the American Conservative entitled The Botany Club: Gay Kids in Catholic Schools Eve Tushnet processes some of this given her experience growing up in a progressive private high school. She weights the pros and cons of what an organization like this might mean for students in the context of a Roman Catholic school. Here she makes the follow observation.

How could an openly-acknowledged Gay-Straight Alliance aid in this discernment? Well, for one thing, its relationship to the adults around it would not need to be antagonistic. The school chaplain or a local priest could attend some of the meetings, and talk with the kids about any misconceptions they may have about the faith. Specifically, I often hear that it’s okay for the Church to require (most) priests to be celibate, since they chose that way of life, but it’s cruel to require celibacy of gay people since we didn’t choose to be gay. This isn’t a good way to think about vocation–you don’t always choose what God is asking of you, and it’s rare that the greatest sacrifices in your life are the ones you chose entirely freely. A priest talking honestly about his own discernment process, and whether or not he felt directly “called” to celibacy, might offer a better model of discernment–and a better understanding of the purposes and challenges of a celibate life.

She makes the following statement in the next paragraph: Every form of love has its own kind of cross.

Choice: The Great American Demand and Expectation Continue reading →