What would you do? Catholic school paper.

[icarus]

Gacked from misting.

True Story: A religion teacher assigned her class an essay on what makes a good Christian. One student wrote about praying nightly, say no to abortion, banning gay marriage, and donating money. The other student wrote about talking to God and allowing people to enjoy their lives, and supporting gay marriage. The day the teacher was to hand the papers back, she called up the second student and told him she would pray for him when he went to hell. The student asked why would he be going to hell, and why he got an F on his paper. The teacher told him that Catholicism is against gay marriage. The student looked at her for a minute, then said aloud, "I'm gay." The teacher kicked him out of class as if he had said fuck or worshiped Satan. A girl in the back of class who had a boyfriend and was obviously straight got up and left too.

If you would leave the classroom, repost this. It doesn't matter if you're straight, bi, or gay. It doesn't matter if you're Catholic or not. Everyone is a human being and deserves happiness.

I'm not sure I would have left though. Since I'm never going to change a Catholic school's policy I think I would have stayed and given the teacher a really bad time for the rest of the quarter. I've noticed that when a "good" student acts up a little, the bad students get really out of control.

Comments

[moriann.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that Catholic schools usually have more orthodox views on 'what should a good catholic think' than many of the Church officials not to mention ordinary people. From what I've heard about catholic schools in the States (I suppose that was where it happened?) they still hold on to beliefs that few Catholics support nowadays. In an open-minded country like America it really doesn't make much sense.

In my country it's a totally different problem. Here 97% of population claims to be Catholic and we don't have Catholic schools per se - Catholicism is taught in all of them and though the classes aren't compulsory not many people decide not to take them (moreover, in order not to take them you need a permission slip from your parents, so it can't be just your own decision). And speaking up about gay rights/abortion or criticising the Church's policies is sure to get you trouble. I don't mean it to sound like it's some kind of a totalitarian catholic regime but the problem is that even when people do have a different opinion they don't usually speak up because they fear the consequences. And so the Church law becomes more important than international human rights.

For example, take the gay rights parades. They are organised all over the world, even in China, which is notorious for ignoring the citizens' rights, and the authorities don't make a problem out of it. But not here. Last year, 'the Equality Parade' (that's what it's called here) was to take place in the capital but the mayor prohibited it. This year, he did it again, but many people came anyway. Unfortunately, there also was a second gathering and it's sole purpose seemed to be throwing rocks and invectives at those demonstraiting their support for gay rights. The above events earned us a place on Amnesty International's list of countries that break human rights, right next to places like Cuba, China and other authoritarian regimes. And it's not someplace in the Africa or deep in Asia that I'm describing but right in the middle of Europe and a member of the EU.

So, we'd have a diffenrent outcome of this situation here, I reckon. It would be much more people leaving the classroom but rather in protest to having to sit next to a gay person. (That's not an exaggeration - a recent survey showed that 60% of my fellow countrymen would be bothered by the fact that their neighbour is gay. Honestly.)