ANALYSIS: Public Funding Erodes Ideological Freedom, Say Ontario Catholic School Stakeholders

Grade 11 student Josh Alexander is arrested outside St. Joseph's Catholic High School in Renfrew, Ont., on Feb. 6, 2023, for disregarding the terms of a school suspension due to his protest against the school's transgender bathroom policy. (Chris Dacey)

News Analysis

Public funding means the government, not the church or the faith, pulls the ideological strings in Ontario’s Catholic school system, some stakeholders say. And this particularly affects how the schools handle matters of gender and sexuality.

It’s a cautionary tale to any institution assured it will remain independent when accepting government funding, says Jake Zwart, executive director of the Ontario Christian Home Educators’ Connection.

“Initially there won’t be any strings,” Zwart told The Epoch Times. But after some years, when you’re already reliant on the funding, he said, the conversation will turn to, “It is, after all, government money, so we can tell you what you have to do with the government money.”

He added, “Even though it’s your money because they taxed you, that’s not the perception.”

Zwart has watched Ontario’s education system closely for decades, even as he chose to homeschool his four boys, and seen this play out.

The tension between traditional faith and modern approaches to gender and sexuality has erupted in Catholic school boards across the province recently. In some cases, police have even been called to board meetings.

The conflict came to the fore in recent months with the case of Josh Alexander, a Grade 11 student who was barred from St. Joseph’s Catholic High School in Renfrew for the rest of the school year for insisting on expressing his belief that God created only two genders.

The school said his views were harmful to transgender students. He was arrested on Feb. 6 after he disregarded the terms of a suspension set by the school, believing it to be discriminatory.

Alexander, 17, told The Epoch Times he believes Catholic schools “have to push even harder to be noticed and almost get a higher social credit score than the public board, because they rely totally on the funding, and they’re afraid of losing it.”

Another contentious issue is whether Catholic schools should raise or display the pride flag.

The York Catholic District School Board (YCDSB) is currently deciding whether to fly the Progress Pride flag for Pride month in June. The board has strongly stood behind the LGBTQ community in its recent public statements, but spokesperson Mark Brosens told The Epoch Times via email that parents against flying the flag are still welcome to voice their opposition in a respectful manner.

Reactions to such conflicts by the province’s minister of education, church leaders, and the Ontario Human Rights Commission reveal the tenuous hold Catholics maintain on their publicly funded Catholic schools.

The right to a publicly funded Catholic school system was written into Canada’s Constitution at the time of Confederation in 1867. It was key in uniting the French Catholic half of the budding nation with the English Protestant half.

This right protects elementary schools, but high schools were created later and Ontario only began fully funding Catholic high schools in 1985 under the Progressive Conservative government of Premier Bill Davis. At the time, there was a major debate within the Catholic community as to whether the government funding would eventually come with more strings attached.

The Church’s Stance

In a March interview with Argentine newspaper La Nación, Pope Francis said that “gender ideology” is “dangerous.” At a meeting with bishops in 2016, he also spoke out against teaching children they can choose their gender, according to a translation by the Catholic News Agency.

The Archdiocese of Toronto declared in 2019 that the Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB) was right to resist a Ministry of Education policy that sought to include “gender identity” protections in the codes of conduct for all Ontario school boards.

“We do not accept the view of the human person which underlies this terminology, since that view is not compatible with our faith,” the Archdiocese said. It said the board had correctly exercised its right to religious freedom which is referenced in the Ontario Human Rights Code.

This Archdiocese statement was presented as evidence in ongoing disciplinary hearings against TCDSB trustee Mike Del Grande, who is accused of making LGBTQ students feel unsafe.

He is being investigated as a teacher, rather than as a trustee, by the Ontario College of Teachers, and the allegation is that he inappropriately expressed his opposition to adding “gender identity” wording into the board’s code of conduct.

Del Grande’s fellow trustee Markus de Domenico testified at a disciplinary hearing on April 11 that he thinks Catholic schools should favour inclusion over directions from the church.

The Archdiocese declined to comment further when The Epoch Times reached out for an interview. The Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario also declined to be interviewed.

Ontario’s bishops have expressed support for the faith-based Fully Alive program of sex education in Catholic schools despite it having come under heavy criticism by some groups. Critics say it excludes LGBTQ people because it emphasizes that heterosexual marriage is the only sacramentally approved context for sexual relationships.

A source familiar with the inner workings of the Catholic system in Ontario, who asked not to be named as he is not authorized to discuss these matters publicly, described how the schools have become increasingly secular.

The local bishop may be consulted on matters of faith in the schools, he said, but usually when secular views clash with the faith, the secular view wins because the government—a secular entity—provides the funding.

While Catholic elementary schools require that the child, or at least one parent, be baptized, Catholic high schools are open to anyone. This is where it becomes difficult to maintain the Catholicity of the school, he said. Yet many non-Catholics send their children to Catholic schools precisely because of the good environment created by the faith, he said.

Flag

Education Minister Stephen Lecce met with Toronto’s new Archbishop, Francis Leo, in April and reaffirmed his “unshakeable commitment to protecting Catholic education in Ontario,” he said on Instagram. His office did not respond to an Epoch Times inquiry as to how far Catholic independence will go, whether for example, Lecce could force a Catholic board to fly a pride flag.

In response to the YCDSB flag controversy in his own riding, Lecce told reporters in Burlington on May 1 that flying the flag is “something that’s done to send a signal of respect and inclusion, and I would welcome that in publicly funded schools.”

He said he would not, however, intervene in the board’s decision.

In 2021, Halton’s Catholic board faced similar backlash for resisting the flag. Then-Ontario human rights commissioner Ena Chadha wrote an open letter to the board saying in no uncertain terms that the board should fly the flag, and that it may be found guilty of discrimination if it doesn’t.

The Pope, Toronto’s Archdiocese, and Ontario’s bishops have all expressed concern about schools affirming LGBTQ identities. The Progress Pride flag in particular has colours that represent the transgender community, above and beyond the rainbow flag which represents only homosexuals.