Recent developments in Canada highlight the extreme danger of allowing government to get involved in the funding of private schools. In short, taxpayer-funded Catholic schools in the Canadian province of Alberta are being threatened with closure. The reason: refusing to promote homosexuality, gender confusion, masturbation, anal sex, and other elements of the mandated “sex education” curriculum. Americans should take note.
Already, Catholic schools in Alberta are forced to teach the government curriculum, much of which would horrify American parents and especially Christians. Catholic leaders justify their schools’ collusion with the state by claiming they teach the government’s dumbed-down, immoral curriculum “through a Catholic lens.” But now, even that is not enough to satisfy the government.
Basically, Catholic leaders said it would be “problematic” to push the LGBT agenda on children in church schools. The Catholic superintendents’ association noted that Catholic schools would be “unable to teach any outcome requiring promotion of homosexual relationships.” They also said their schools could not “promote modern gender theory or anything that is ideologically opposed to Catholic teaching.”
In response, anti-Christian authorities exploded. Late last month, provincial authorities in Alberta decided it was simply “unacceptable” that Catholic schools there sought to modify the government’s “sex education” curriculum to conform with Catholic and biblical teaching. They said there would be no negotiating, and that the LGBT agenda, anal sex, and all the rest would be taught in all schools, including Catholic schools. “Under no circumstances will we enforce or condone a sexual health curriculum that normalizes an absence of consent, refuses to talk about contraception and other things that protect the health of sexually active young people, or in any way marginalizes sexual minorities,” declared Alberta Premier Rachel Notley in response to Catholic resistance. “We will not use public dollars to have sexual health programs that deny science, that deny evidence, and that deny human rights.”
Notley, a leftwing extremist determined to indoctrinate all children with her ideology, vowed that Catholic schools would not be able to teach the Catholic church’s views on sexuality, sin, marriage, or other topics. “They can continue to work on [the proposed alternative sex education program] all they want, but we ultimately approve the curriculum that goes into schools — and this kind of curriculum will not happen,” she added.
Alberta’s “education minister,” David Eggen, echoed the threats against Catholic schools resisting the indoctrination of children into perversion. “I’m deeply concerned to see it suggested that providing Alberta students with accurate information on these important topics is ‘problematic,’ or that there’s something wrong with being gay,” he declared. “I can assure Albertans that, under our government, any curriculum changes will be inclusive of all students — no matter their gender identity or sexual orientation…. There’s no [room for] negotiation for that, I can tell you.”
In a letter to Catholics, the bishops of Alberta sounded the alarm. “Calls to dismantle our publicly funded Catholic school system are growing ever louder, and we must not ignore them,” they wrote, urging Catholics to defend their faith and their schools. “We do not and we shall not apologize to anyone for our faith or for our schools. Everyone knows that the existence of our schools, fully permeated with our faith, is a constitutional right.”
While conceding that they would continue teaching the government’s school curriculum, the bishops vowed to teach Catholic views on sexuality, too. “Catholic schools teach the provincial curriculum through a Catholic lens,” they said. “It is what we have always done; it is what we shall continue to do in all matters, including health and wellness.”
If officials get their way, though, that will not be happening. Similar developments have taken place in other countries where government got involved in private education. It begins with some government funding, and ends with total control of what is taught to all children.
The Newman Report recently spoke with a Christian pastor in America whose Christian school was forced to close shortly after the adoption of “reforms” authorizing taxpayer funding for charter schools and vouchers. And those government-funded schools, unfortunately, are forced to obey the government’s decrees, meaning the children will no longer be receiving a good Christian education.
Ostensible conservatives have long pointed to Alberta as a model for education. But while many well-meaning conservatives, Christians, and libertarians support the concept of “school choice,” as the scheme is being marketed, the dangers are becoming very clear. Americans who hope to protect children from government’s increasingly extreme “education” schemes must resist the temptation to get in bed with government — period.
