Substitute teacher questions limits of diversity – The Herald-Independent: The Herald-Independent, Monona & Cottage Grove, WI

http://www.hngnews.com/monona_cottage_grove/article_ad09513c-ac0e-11e6-a158-cb35f34de0c9.html

Thursday, November 17, 2016 12:30 pm
By Kevin Passon [email protected]

“Matthew McCormick was administering a test to a social studies class at Monona Grove High School earlier this fall when, upon reviewing the test questions, he came across one that stirred his conscience.

The question asked students to complete the sentence, “Gender is defined by _____.” The correct response, according to the answer key was “culture.” But, McCormick, a Catholic, didn’t believe it.

“Gender is not something we determine for ourselves; it is a gift from God, one we should accept gratefully,” McCormick said later. “The test attempted to make the distinction between biological sex, which one does not choose, and gender, which according to ‘gender ideology,’ one does choose, or their culture chooses. I disagree.”
McCormick said he did not tell students what to believe, but he did allow them to take the exam home and have a discussion with their parents about the issue if they so desired. Some took him up on the offer, some did not.

“I want students’ parents to inform them what their ‘personal cultural identity’ is, not the state,” McCormick said. “I do not believe in secrecy between the classroom and the home. It smacks of totalitarianism.”

A few days later, McCormick was informed he would no longer be allowed to serve as a substitute teacher in the Monona Grove School District. However, he said he was never told why.
MG Principal Paul Brost said he could not discuss specifics about McCormick’s case, although he said the district has the authority to choose who can teach in the schools. The McCormick case was not the first such instance, he said.

He also referred to the district’s strategic plan and policy on diversity.

“We are very clear when it comes to our policy on this (gender issues),” Brost said. “It is clearly defined, abiding by the legal issues that go with it. We try to do what we think is in the best interests of the students.”

In August 2015, the Monona Grove School Board adopted a policy regarding nondiscrimination guidelines for transgender students and students nonconforming to gender role stereotypes.
In the policy, gender identity is defined as a person’s deeply held sense or psychological knowledge of their own gender, regardless of the biological sex they were assigned at birth.
McCormick believes public education has stretched the limits of diversity, and those who disagree are punished.

“I thought it was best for the student to have their own private conversation with the parents over these issues, hence, I allowed the exam to go home on my own authority, as teacher-of-the-moment and charged with the responsibility of acting in the best interest of students while I am there,” he said. “I cannot violate my conscience as a teacher or a parent, and I am not a robot. So much for diversity.”

McCormick described himself as a thoughtful Catholic, one who tries to understand what the church teaches.

“I am not surprised our public educators have once again failed our young,” he said. “How could they not, without integrity and a foundational grounding in Christian philosophy? We must pray for those people, especially the young, who for some reason experience ‘gender dysphoria,’ not encourage their illness, to their own detriment. This is an issue for modern medicine to address, not a Soviet-like rehabilitation camp masquerading as a public school in America.”

A person’s belief that one is something that one is not, is at best, a sign of confused thinking, according to a statement from the Catholic Medical Association. At worst, it is a delusion or disorder of the mind, not of the body.

“Medical ethics, beginning with a respect for the dignity of the human person as an embodied true male or female, and science, not cultural ideologies or political correctness, serve as the basis of all true healthcare,” the Nov. 3 statement read.

McCormick said the problem with diversity is that many of those who strongly espouse it also show little tolerance for those who disagree with them on social issues.”

I am a product of public schools, which were fine and posed no challenge to my beliefs, when I attended.

-by Rachel Baker, 12/15/16, age 20, graduate of Canon City High School, Colorado

“I remember when a boy asked me for a picture. At first I ignored him because I didn’t understand.

A picture of my face? Why would he need that if sees me at school every day? (Ignorant, naïve, I know.)

I was 16 years old, the new girl from Michigan, just yippy, skipping my way around.

Eventually, I figured out what a picture really meant and I told him if he ever asked again, we would not speak.

I remember when a different boy asked to send me a picture. Again, I said no.

I remember hearing about the time the basketball team unlocked one of the player’s phones and found dozens of pictures of naked peers of ours.

I remember that when I was the captain of the volleyball team, one of the younger players told me she used to be one of those girls that sent pictures. I looked at her and told her I am very glad she doesn’t do that anymore. It never even crossed my mind to report any of this.

Let’s be brutally honest here. This is just the world we live in. Our parents and administrators can be shocked but the issues their generation faced are very different from the ones my generation faces. They didn’t walk around with pornography in their pockets, accessible at the touch of a finger via smart phones. They didn’t even have texting for goodness sake, so sending naked pictures to their boyfriends or girlfriends, or just a hot guy for that matter, wasn’t even possible. Right or wrong, good or bad, technology has opened a whole new world and this generation is the first one to navigate that. So let’s forget about our parents for a second.

High school is a weird time of life. I spent most of high school trying to get into the higher classes with the smart kids, earn playing time on the volleyball team, break my way into the “in-crowd” of jocks, be invited to all the parties, date the best football, baseball, and basketball players. I had a lot of fun, enjoying the vanity of it all.

I used to drive around at night or get out of class and walk around the school grounds with one of my best guy friends, talking about the annoying, clingy girls or boys in our lives, laughing at the people who claim to be “in love” because it is only high school. What happens now isn’t that big of a deal and doesn’t really matter in the long run.

We were dead wrong.

Let me get vulnerable for a minute. I didn’t send or receive any pictures and I’ve never looked at pornography. But I did other things. My mistakes look different but they were very much colossal and detrimental to me. I thought I was just having fun with the popular kids or just hanging out with the cute boy. It was just the norm to let things go a little, or way too far. Everyone else was doing it, right? It was exciting and inviting to live like my life was an episode of Awkward.

If you are someone who has known me closely the last two years, you know that I am not the same person I was in high school. You also know that I have battled hard with the burdens and baggage of regrets that I carry from choices I made in high school.

Let me tell you why. Because the choices you make, especially the choices you make regarding anything sexual, whether it is going all the way or not, become an identity issue. I have felt the shame and the guilt and the worthlessness and the isolation and the abandonment and the insecurity and the doubt and the emptiness and the void that is tied to my choices. Those things became part of who I thought I was. Without knowing it, what I did changed how I viewed myself.

Maybe you know what I’m talking about because you’ve been there. Maybe you are still living in the moment so you think I am off base and being overly dramatic. Maybe your experience is different. Maybe you think that since you’ve never gone all the way or never got behind the wheel after a few too many or actually rolled a joint you’re off the hook on this one.

I don’t know what you’re thinking but I do know that whatever your pitfall is, you don’t get to climb out unscraped. There will always be consequences to our choices. Some cut a little deeper or take a little longer to appear than others but they will always come, in one form or another. Sadly, some of you reading this, have probably come to know this all too personally in the last week.

What happens in high school does matter.

I’ve heard that teachers and coaches are trying to handle this situation by talking about the legacy you leave behind at Cañon City High School. Nice try, but truly, that is the least of your worries. What really matters is those things that you can’t leave behind when you finally graduate. I’m talking about the baggage you take with you wherever you go from there, the deepest parts of your heart and mind that you can’t just check at the door when they hand you your diploma.

So next time you’re about to take your clothes off in the backseat of his car late at night on Skyline Drive, think about how it’s going to feel when you find the person you want to spend the rest of your life with but you have to explain to him or her the time hanging out became intimate with that kid from high school when you were 16. Next time you’re about to down three shots of liquor, and with only half a brain, end up in bed with that girl on Saturday night, think about what Sunday morning is going to feel like, trying to remember what happened. Or worse yet, when you are on your 8th beer and getting in your car to go home for the night, think about what it would feel like to spend ‘the best years of your life’ in a cell because you crashed into another driver and he or she didn’t pull through. Next time you’re about to push send with that erotic picture, imagine yourself with a son of your own and never knowing when he might discover that picture that resurfaced out of nowhere. Next time you are about to pull up porn on your phone or laptop, remember that those are real people you are watching behind that screen. That is somebody’s daughter or sister or aunt or mother. Fast forward to your marriage and your future wife or husband, always wondering if he or she is good enough, if he or she will ever measure up to all the men or women you have exposed your eyes to over the years…”

http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/marriage/promotion-and-defense-of-marriage/upload/Gender-Ideology-Select-Teaching-Resources.pdf

The following select excerpts from various sources are intended to provide some information (not exhaustive) in the area of “gender theory”/“gender ideology” and may be helpful for educational purposes in the pastoral and public policy context.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

Sexual Identity

(No. 2333) “Everyone, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity. Physical, moral, and spiritual difference and complementarity are oriented toward the goods of marriage and the flourishing of family life. The harmony of the couple and of society depends in part on the way in which the complementarity, needs, and mutual support between the sexes are lived out.”

(No. 2393) “By creating the human being man and woman, God gives personal dignity equally to the one and the other. Each of them, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity.”

Body and Soul

(No. 364) “The human body shares in the dignity of “the image of God”: it is a human body precisely because it is animated by a spiritual soul, and it is the whole human person that is intended to become, in the body of Christ, a temple of the Spirit:

Man, though made of body and soul, is a unity. Through his very bodily condition he sums up in himself the elements of the material world. Through him they are thus brought to their highest perfection and can raise their voice in praise freely given to the Creator. For this reason man may not despise his bodily life. Rather he is obliged to regard his body as good and to hold it in honor since God has created it and will raise it up on the last day.”

Modesty

(No. 2521) “Purity requires modesty, an integral part of temperance. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person. It means refusing to unveil what should remain hidden. It is ordered to chastity to whose sensitivity it bears witness. It guides how one looks at others and behaves toward them in conformity with the dignity of persons and their solidarity.”

(No. 2522) “Modesty protects the mystery of persons and their love… Modesty is decency. It inspires one’s choice of clothing. It keeps silence or reserve where there is evident risk of unhealthy curiosity. It is discreet.”

(No. 2523) “There is a modesty of the feelings as well as of the body. It protests, for example, against the voyeuristic explorations of the human body in certain advertisements, or against the solicitations of certain media that go too far in the exhibition of intimate things. Modesty inspires a way of life which makes it possible to resist the allurements of fashion and the pressures of prevailing ideologies.”

Privacy

(No. 1907) “First, the common good presupposes respect for the person as such. In the name of the common good, public authorities are bound to respect the fundamental and inalienable rights of the human person. Society should permit each of its members to fulfill his vocation. In particular, the common good resides in the conditions for the exercise of the natural freedoms indispensable for the development of the human vocation, such as ‘the right to act according to a sound norm of conscience and to safeguard . . . privacy, and rightful freedom also in matters of religion.’”

Mutilation

Pope Francis

Encyclical letter Laudato Si’ (2015)
(No. 155) “Human ecology also implies another profound reality: the relationship between human

life and the moral law, which is inscribed in our nature and is necessary for the creation of a more dignified environment. Pope Benedict XVI spoke of an ‘ecology of man’, based on the fact that ‘man too has a nature that he must respect and that he cannot manipulate at will’. It is enough to recognize that our body itself establishes us in a direct relationship with the environment and with other living beings. The acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation. Learning to accept our body, to care for it and to respect its fullest meaning, is an essential element of any genuine human ecology. Also, valuing one’s own body in its femininity or masculinity is necessary if I am going to be able to recognize myself in an encounter with someone who is different. In this way we can joyfully accept the specific gifts of another man or woman, the work of God the Creator, and find mutual enrichment. It is not a healthy attitude which would seek to cancel out sexual difference because it no longer knows how to confront it.”

Address to Équipes de Notre Dame (September 10, 2015)
“This mission which is entrusted to them, is all the more important inasmuch as the image of the family — as God wills it, composed of one man and one woman in view of the good of the spouses and also of the procreation and upbringing of children — is deformed through powerful adverse projects supported by ideological trends.”
Full text

Address to the Bishops of Puerto Rico (June 8, 2015)

“The complementarity of man and woman, the pinnacle of divine creation, is being questioned by the so-called gender ideology, in the name of a more free and just society. The differences between man and woman are not for opposition or subordination, but for communion and generation, always in the ‘image and likeness’ of God.”

(No. 2297) “Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended amputations, mutilations, and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral law.”

General Audience on Man and Woman (April 15, 2015)

“For example, I ask myself, if the so-called gender theory is not, at the same time, an expression of frustration and resignation, which seeks to cancel out sexual difference because it no longer knows how to confront it. Yes, we risk taking a step backwards. The removal of difference in fact creates a problem, not a solution.”

Address in Naples (March 23, 2015)

“The crisis of the family is a societal fact. There are also ideological colonializations of the family, different paths and proposals in Europe and also coming from overseas. Then, there is the mistake of the human mind — gender theory — creating so much confusion.”
Full text

Meeting with Families in Manila (January 16, 2015)

“Let us be on guard against colonization by new ideologies. There are forms of ideological colonization which are out to destroy the family.”

Pope Benedict XVI
Encyclical letter Deus Caritas Est (2005)

(No. 11) “While the biblical narrative does not speak of punishment, the idea is certainly present that man is somehow incomplete, driven by nature to seek in another the part that can make him whole, the idea that only in communion with the opposite sex can he become ‘complete’… Eros is somehow rooted in man’s very nature; Adam is a seeker, who ‘abandons his mother and father’ in order to find woman; only together do the two represent complete humanity and become ‘one flesh’. The second aspect is equally important. From the standpoint of creation, eros directs man towards marriage, to a bond which is unique and definitive; thus, and only thus, does it fulfil its deepest purpose. Corresponding to the image of a monotheistic God is monogamous marriage.” Full text

Address to the Pontifical Council “Cor Unum” (January 19, 2013)

“The Christian vision of man is, in fact, a great ‘yes’ to the dignity of persons called to an intimate filial communion of humility and faithfulness. The human being is not a self-sufficient individual nor an anonymous element in the group. Rather he is a unique and unrepeatable person, intrinsically ordered to relationships and sociability. Thus the Church reaffirms her great ‘yes’ to the dignity and beauty of marriage as an expression of the faithful and generous bond between man and woman, and her no to ‘gender’ philosophies, because the reciprocity between male and female is an expression of the beauty of nature willed by the Creator.”

(No. 5) “Yet the contemporary way of exalting the body is deceptive. Eros, reduced to pure ‘sex’, has become a commodity, a mere ‘thing’ to be bought and sold, or rather, man himself becomes a commodity. This is hardly man’s great ‘yes’ to the body. On the contrary, he now considers his body and his sexuality as the purely material part of himself, to be used and exploited at will.”

Address to the Roman Curia (December 21, 2012)

“These words lay the foundation for what is put forward today under the term ‘gender’ as a new philosophy of sexuality. According to this philosophy, sex is no longer a given element of nature that man has to accept and personally make sense of: it is a social role that we choose for ourselves, while in the past it was chosen for us by society. The profound falsehood of this theory and of the anthropological revolution contained within it is obvious. People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being. They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves.”

Address to the German Bundestag (September 22, 2011)

“…There is also an ecology of man. Man too has a nature that he must respect and that he cannot manipulate at will. Man is not merely self-creating freedom. Man does not create himself. He is intellect and will, but he is also nature, and his will is rightly ordered if he respects his nature, listens to it and accepts himself for who he is, as one who did not create himself. In this way, and in no other, is true human freedom fulfilled.”

Pope St. John Paul II Letter to Families (1994)

(No. 6) “Man is created ‘from the very beginning’ as male and female: the light of all humanity… is marked by this primordial duality. From it there derive the ‘masculinity’ and the ‘femininity’ of individuals, just as from it every community draws its own unique richness in the mutual fulfillment of persons… Hence one can discover, at the very origins of human society, the qualities of communion and of complementarity.”

(No. 19)“…the human family is facing the challenge of a new Manichaeanism, in which body and spirit are put in radical opposition; the body does not receive life from the spirit, and the spirit does not give life to the body. Man thus ceases to live as a person and a subject. Regardless of all intentions and declarations to the contrary, he becomes merely an object. This neo-Manichaean culture has led, for example, to human sexuality being regarded more as an area for manipulation and exploitation than as the basis of that primordial wonder which led Adam on the morning of creation to exclaim before Eve: ‘This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh’ (Gen 2:23).”

Theology of the Body

Pope John Paul II, Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body, trans. Michael Waldstein (Boston: Pauline Books & Media, 2006)

(No. 9:3) “The account of the creation of man in Genesis 1 affirms from the beginning and directly that man was created in the image of God inasmuch as he is male and female… man became the image of God not only through his own humanity, but also through the communion of persons, which man and woman form from the very beginning.”

(No. 9:5) “Masculinity and femininity express the twofold aspect of man’s somatic constitution… and indicate, in addition… the new consciousness of the meaning of one’s body. This meaning, one can say, consists in reciprocal enrichment.”

(No. 10:1) “Femininity in some way finds itself before masculinity, while masculinity confirms itself through femininity. Precisely the function of sex [that is, being male or female], which in some way is ‘constitutive for the person’ (not only ‘an attribute of the person’), shows how deeply man, with all his spiritual solitude, with the uniqueness and unrepeatability proper to the person, is constituted by the body as ‘he’ or ‘she’.”

(No. 14:4) “The body, which expresses femininity ‘for’ masculinity and, vice versa, masculinity ‘for’ femininity, manifests the reciprocity and the communion of persons.”

Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith

Letter on the Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and in the World (2004)

(No. 2) “In this perspective [i.e., that of gender ideology], physical difference, termed sex, is minimized, while the purely cultural element, termed gender, is emphasized to the maximum and held to be primary. The obscuring of the difference or duality of the sexes has enormous consequences on a variety of levels. This theory of the human person, intended to promote prospects for equality of women through liberation from biological determinism, has in reality inspired ideologies which, for example, call into question the family, in its natural two-parent structure of mother and father, and make homosexuality and heterosexuality virtually equivalent, in a new model of polymorphous sexuality.”

(No. 12) “Male and female are thus revealed as belonging ontologically to creation and destined therefore to outlast the present time, evidently in a transfigured form.”
Full text

Persona Humana: Declaration on Certain Questions Concerning Sexual Ethics (1975)

(III) “… There can be no true promotion of man’s dignity unless the essential order of his nature is respected.”
Full text

Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church

(No. 224) “Faced with theories that consider gender identity as merely the cultural and social product of the interaction between the community and the individual, independent of personal sexual identity without any reference to the true meaning of sexuality, the Church does not tire of repeating her teaching: ‘Everyone, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity. Physical, moral and spiritual difference and complementarities are oriented towards the goods of marriage and the flourishing of family life. . . .’ According to this perspective, it is obligatory that positive law be conformed to the natural law, according to which sexual identity is indispensable, because it is the objective condition for forming a couple in marriage” (emphasis in original, internal citation omitted).

Pontifical Council for the Family

Family, Marriage and “De Facto” Unions (2000)

(No. 8) “In the process that could be described as the gradual cultural and human de-structuring of the institution of marriage, the spread of a certain ideology of ‘gender’ should not be underestimated. According to this ideology, being a man or a woman is not determined fundamentally by sex but by culture. Therefore, the very bases of the family and inter-personal relationships are attacked.”

(No. 8) “Starting from the decade between 1960-1970, some theories… hold not only that generic sexual identity (‘gender’) is the product of an interaction between the community and the individual, but that this generic identity is independent from personal sexual identity: i.e., that masculine and feminine genders in society are the exclusive product of social factors, with no relation to any truth about the sexual dimension of the person. In this way, any sexual attitude can be justified, including homosexuality, and it is society that ought to change in order to include other genders, together with male and female, in its way of shaping social life.”

USCCB: Various Documents

Chairmen Letter to U.S. Senators regarding ENDA Legislation (2013)

“ENDA’s definition of ‘gender identity’ lends force of law to a tendency to view ‘gender as nothing more than a social construct or psychosocial reality, which a person may choose at variance from his or her biological sex.”
Full text

ENDA Backgrounder (2013)

“ENDA defines ‘gender identity’ as ‘the gender-related identity, appearance, or mannerisms or other gender-related characteristics of an individual, with or without regard to the individual’s designated sex at birth.’”

“ENDA’s treatment of ‘gender identity would lend the force of law to a tendency to view ‘gender’ as nothing more than a social construct or psychosocial reality that can be chosen at variance from one’s biological sex. Second, ENDA’s treatment of ‘gender identity’ would adversely affect the privacy and associational rights of others. In this respect, ENDA would require workplace rules that violate the legitimate privacy expectations of other employees… Third, ENDA would make it far more difficult for organizations and employees with moral and religious convictions about the importance of sexual difference, and the biological basis of sexual identity, to speak and act on those beliefs.”

Chairmen Statement on ENDA-style Executive Order (2014)

“[The executive order] lends the economic power of the federal government to a deeply flawed understanding of human sexuality, to which faithful Catholics and many other people of faith will not assent…

“The executive order prohibits ‘gender identity’ discrimination, a prohibition that is previously unknown at the federal level, and that is predicated on the false idea that ‘gender’ is nothing more than a social construct or psychological reality that can be chosen at variance from one’s biological sex. This is a problem not only of principle but of practice, as it will jeopardize the privacy and associational rights of both federal contractor employees and federal employees.”

Chairmen Statement on Department of Labor Regulations (2014)

Chairmen Statement on the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act (2013)

“Unfortunately, we cannot support the version of the ‘Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2013’ passed by the House of Representatives and the Senate (S. 47) because of certain language it contains. Among our concerns are those provisions in S. 47 that refer to ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity.’ All persons must be protected from violence, but codifying the classifications ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity’ as contained in S. 47 is problematic. These two classifications are unnecessary to establish the just protections due to all persons. They undermine the meaning and importance of sexual difference. They are unjustly exploited for purposes of marriage redefinition, and marriage is the only institution that unites a man and a woman with each other and with any children born from their union.”

Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services (5th Edition)

(No. 53) “Direct sterilization of either men or women, whether permanent or temporary, is not permitted in a Catholic health care institution. Procedures that induce sterility are permitted when their direct effect is the cure or alleviation of a present and serious pathology and a simpler treatment is not available.”

(No. 70) “Catholic health care organizations are not permitted to engage in immediate material cooperation in actions that are intrinsically immoral, such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, and direct sterilization.”
Full text

For further related USCCB resources, see:

•   USCCB, Marriage: Love and Life in the Divine Plan (2009)
•   USCCB, Ministry to Persons with a Homosexual Inclination: Guidelines for Pastoral Care

  (2006)

•   Made for Each Other (video, viewer’s guide, and resource booklet), available at

  www.marriageuniqueforareason.org.

“The regulations published on December 3 [2014] by the U.S. Department of Labor implement the objectionable Executive Order that President Obama issued in July to address what the Administration has described as ‘sexual orientation’ and ‘gender identity’ discrimination in employment by federal contractors. . . . [T]he regulations advance the false ideology of ‘gender identity,’ which ignores biological reality and harms the privacy and associational rights of both contractors and their employees.”

March 31, 2016, at 10:22 AM  |  By Adam Cassandra  |

To help Catholic schools protect their Catholic identity while compassionately addressing issues of human sexuality — including the sometimes thorny issues of same-sex attraction and gender identity — The Cardinal Newman Society has released a new resource with valuable guidance on forming policies in these areas. Fully consistent with Church teaching, the guide can help schools prevent confusion and even litigation while strengthening their important work of evangelization.

“Human Sexuality Policies for Catholic Schools” was developed by Dr. Denise Donohue and Dr. Dan Guernsey, deputy director and director (respectively) of K-12 programs for the Newman Society. Their work draws partly upon the counsel and policy recommendations of the Alliance Defending Freedom, a Christian organization of top legal experts on religious freedom, and the teaching documents of several popes, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and key Vatican congregations.

“Human sexuality policies should, to the degree possible, not single out any particular group or behavior,” the authors write, “but be placed in the larger context of assisting all members of the school community in virtue formation, furthering of the common good, and the Catholic evangelical mission of the school.”

Even so, Catholic educators today have an urgent need for policies that help them teach and uphold truth while avoiding lawsuits by students or employees, as well as violations of religious freedom by local, state and federal agencies. Fueled by social media and an unsympathetic press, Catholic schools face intense pressure to compromise their teaching and mission rather than be charged with discrimination based on “gender identity,” “gender expression” or “sexual orientation.”

But standing firm against the culture can also cause problems for Catholic schools, if their policies aren’t well-crafted. In early March, a Catholic school in Rhode Island made national headlines after refusing to accept or enroll students who claimed an opposite-sex gender because the school’s facilities were designed according to biological sex. Following intense scrutiny and accusations of hate and intolerance from some alumni, the ACLU, other activists and the media, administrators reversed the policy.

Both public and private schools are being asked to accommodate “transgender” students in restrooms, locker rooms and showers by, for example, allowing a biologically male student who identifies as a female to use the girls’ restroom and showers, or designating “gender neutral” facilities. Such options might avoid public criticism, but they are inconsistent with a Catholic view of sex and gender.

Last January, Nebraska’s high school athletic association considered a new gender identity policy, but the state’s bishops expressed concerned about spiritual harm to students. “It would be unjust to allow a harmful and deceptive gender ideology to shape either what is taught or how activities are conducted in our schools,” the bishops stated. “This would certainly have a negative impact on students’ and society’s attitudes towards the fundamental nature of the human person and the family.”

These sorts of conflicts have led to many questions and concerns surrounding the gender identity issue.

Clearly schools and dioceses face serious legal issues when implementing human sexuality policies. But more important are the moral and spiritual issues to consider. Catholic educators must rightly guide students and their parents to a healthy understanding of sexuality, and away from false but popular assumptions that are at odds with Church teaching.

The Newman Society’s guide includes recommendations for mission statements, faith statements and policies related to sexuality generally, and particular policies for special areas like athletics, dances and clothing.

The guide also provides a selection of Church teachings on human sexuality, a sample letter for prospective employees and parents seeking to enroll their children, and a sample handbook agreement for parents and students.

The Newman Society calls on schools to maintain their integrity with regard to their Catholic mission, while remaining as welcoming as possible to individuals who are confused but sincerely trying to live as God has called them to.

“Sincere questioning of the practices of the Catholic faith in order to more deeply understand them are welcome,” proposed policy language on mission integrity reads, “but openly hostile, public defiance and challenge of Catholic truths or morality are signs that a student, parent, staff or faculty member may not be a fit for our school’s primary evangelical mission and, thus, may be denied admission or may be asked to leave the school.”

With regard to gender, the guide recommends that schools be clear: “One’s biological sex and gender expression are not to be disaggregated, but should be seen in harmony, according to God’s plan.”

“Our given biological sex is part of the divine plan,” the guide reminds school leaders. “The Church teaches that sexual identity is ‘a reality deeply inscribed in man and woman,’ it constitutes but is more than one’s biological identity, and a person ‘should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity.’”

If this is taught to all members of a school community, solutions to particular challenges become more obvious to everyone.

“A member of the school community who wishes to express a gender other than his or her biological sex is understood as operating outside of the ‘reality deeply inscribed’ within,” reads one suggested policy. “Assisting the person in his or her disconnect with this reality, however sincerely experienced, by agreeing to participate in any efforts to change natural gender expression is contrary to the pursuit of the truth.”

This is the opposite of discrimination; it requires great concern for the good of the student.

“Authentic love, a gift of the self for the good of the other, requires that we compassionately dwell in the truth and assist those we love to do the same,” the guide explains.

In instances where students are actively dressing, acting or manipulating their bodies in ways “contrary to God’s plan,” the Newman Society suggests that schools implement language stating: “[Y]oung people, working with their parents, [should] bring these types of issues to their pastor as well as to other trained professionals who might best assist them in clarifying and defining issues of self (and sexual) identity in accord with Catholic teaching and God’s natural plan. The school’s pastoral and counseling services are available to all members of the school community.”

There are numerous notes in these sections and throughout the document for further reading on Catholic teaching.

Public pressure on Catholic schools and legal threats related to sexuality are likely to continue and increase. The Newman Society hopes school administrators and dioceses will find “Human Sexuality Policies for Catholic Schools” a helpful resource in further strengthening and protecting the Catholic identity of their schools, for the purpose of leading students to the Truth in Christ.