Homosexuality Test Administered to Catholic High-Schoolers

A religion test covering students' knowledge of homosexuality administered at a Kitchener, Canada, Catholic high school has upset some Catholics and other religious conservatives.

In keeping with the Ontario provincial government's Equity and Inclusive Education Strategy, teacher Cathy Sousa at Resurrection Catholic Secondary School (pictured) distributed the test to her ninth-grade religion students. According to the conservative blog Right Side Up, which reported on the test, it had three sections: definition, true or false, and short answer. It asked students to define such terms as "coming out" and "homophobia." The true-or-false section had statements such as "A football player or hockey player could be gay," and the last section asked students to write a short paragraph explaining the Catholic Church's teachings on homosexuality.

Some Catholics thought the test undermined church teachings on the subject. "This is a form of indoctrination whereby students come away with the belief that homosexual relationships are equal to heterosexual relationships," wrote Camilla Gunnarson on Right Side Up. "Have our teachers become social engineers?"

Private schools that receive public funding must adhere to the Equity and Inclusive Education Strategy, as public schools do. However, some parents of private-school students have objected to it. Catholic parents in Toronto have called on that city's Catholic school board to amend the equity policy to reflect the church's stance on homosexuality, and a leader of Coptic Christian churches -- an Eastern Orthodox denomination -- is threatening to pull all Coptic students from the Toronto Catholic schools.