Readers Speak Out: November 24, 2019

Wrong decision

Re: Toronto Catholic board votes to include gender terms (Nov. 17):

Gender ideology is incompatible with the teachings of the Catholic Church. According to the Congregation for Catholic Education this ideology denies the “complementarity of male-female relationships” and “the procreative end of sexuality.” Also, it’s “opposed to faith and right reason” since it holds that gender is a matter of personal choice “unconnected to biological sex.”

Yet recently the Toronto Catholic District School Board voted 8-4 to adopt gender terms in its code of conduct. It’s a contradiction for eight trustees, who were expected to uphold Catholic teachings, to have voted for this. 

Did they feel obligated to follow the Minister of Education’s directive to add these terms? If so, they didn’t need to, as section 93 of the Constitution gives Catholic schools the right to impart the teachings of the faith to students. Now students at Toronto Catholic schools will be exposed to an unscientific ideology which will only serve to confuse them.

Claudio Ceolin,

Toronto

Faith trumped

Sadly, the information in the editorial “Trustees get it right” (Nov. 10) was overturned just a week later in an 8-4 vote by the full board of Toronto Catholic school trustees. They voted to include the anti-Catholic terminology of gender identity and expression in the board’s code of conduct. 

The trustees who supported the move exploited the confusing position of the Archdiocese of Toronto to allow for inclusive language if taught through a “Catholic lens.” The idea that one can teach transgendersim using a “Catholic lens” is to give permission for faith to be trumped by political correctness. 

The vote is another attack on Catholic schools coming from those who were elected to defend them. The problem is also that poorly catechized parents elected those eight trustees that voted against Catholic education and publicly celebrated their victory. 

Lou Iacobelli,

Toronto

Eucharist debate

Re: Eucharist is not a prize for the perfect (Nov. 17):

I am surprised by this article by Bob Brehl. A priest who is acting in accordance with canon law within the Catholic Church by denying Joe Biden, who publicly supports abortion and even taunts Catholic teaching, has become the culprit of the right and Biden the hero of the left.

The Diocese of Timmins became the culprit of the right after it spoke for the Church on the issue of same-sex marriage and opposed Charlie Angus, the hero of the left, because, as a Catholic, he supported same-sex marriage.

Who is the culprit here?

Rose Galbraith, 

Hamilton, Ont.

Questionable priorities

Am I the only one who’s more dismayed than reassured by the Canadian Religious Conference’s stated priorities and their rationale?

Sr. Denise Kuyp of the CRC governing board claimed (before the election) that “discernment skills are clearly lacking.” I’m questioning the discernment behind the decision against mentioning abortion, euthanasia and life issues, supposedly because all the federal parties have made it clear they won’t change the status quo. 

Maybe the CRC missed the part where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he would extend euthanasia beyond the present parametres?

Apparently the CRC’s 240 religious orders represent 12,000 members. I’d like to see a breakdown of this number. How many are active? How many are retired? How many voted for these priorities? 

Without this information, it is hard to discern how much weight I should assign to the positions on offer here.

Gilberta F. Van Houtven,

Guelph, Ont.