The hyperbolic rhetoric coming from Catholic parents and school board trustees who object to the Ontario government’s updated sex-ed curriculum, which is scheduled to be implemented province wide in September, was criticized on Canadian Atheist on May 28. The main target of the criticism was the Halton Catholic District School Board, which planned a meeting to vote on Trustee Anthony Danko’s motion “to delay implementing the controversial Liberal government’s sex-ed curriculum for a year.”
The HCDSB meeting took place last night, and parents who attended the meeting got so out of control that
Police had to be called . . . as tempers flared over a failed attempt to delay implementation of Ontario’s new sex education curriculum in Halton Catholic schools.
If, as the disgruntled parents claim, parents are the first educators, then these parents who “continued to yell their disapproval and were slow to vacate the building” are sending this message to their children: lose your temper, yell and refuse to obey a direct order when you don’t get what you want.
One parent claims,
If the curriculum becomes the new standard in schools, it will begin to erode and then destroy the innocence of children, now and for generations to come.
Oakville trustee Paul Marai assures parents that the new sex education curriculum will “be taught within a Catholic lens.” This from an organization that teaches children that Catholic priests are God’s representatives on Earth and should be obeyed at all times. We all know how that turned out: this allowed Catholic priests to destroy the innocence of more children than any sex education curriculum ever will.
However, parents whose children attend HCDSB schools are not the only parents ramping up the hysteria about the Ontario sex education curriculum. On May 22,
A newly-formed parents group in the Peterborough area met Friday outside Liberal MPP Jeff Leal’s office to protest the Wynne government’s planned changes to Ontario’s sex-ed curriculum.
According to the group statement
“This curriculum . . . will wound our children’s purity and may launch them into premature sexual experimentation when they are not yet capable of the critical thinking necessary to understand the consequences of their actions.”
This suggests that children and young adults who attend Catholic schools are taught and encouraged to use critical thinking skills. That’s unlikely, especially during religious education courses or the Fully Alive program, which is
designed to complement the efforts of families, and to pass on a distinctly Catholic view of human life, sexuality, marriage and family. Its focus is the developing person, its content is an extended exploration of what it means to be human, and its core message is hope: The God who created you, the Son who redeemed you, and the Holy Spirit who lives within you will not abandon you.
Yes, parents play an important role in the education of their children. They can fulfill that role by talking openly and honestly with their children, by teaching them critical thinking skills and by removing them from Catholic schools and the toxic influence of Catholic education.
The Planet that created you, the people who taught you, and the conscious conscience that lives within you, will not abandon you.
Really? Where was your conscience a few years ago?