Pride flag, Oecta simply does not understand the concept
TORONTO – The desk of a publisher is usually a dumping ground for requests, ideas, projects (good or bad) and opinions on “course of action” that evoke childhood admonitions like “an idle mind is the devil’s workshop”. Some people are confused about their role in life. A certain René Jansen in de Wal, President of OECTA (the Ontario Catholic English Teachers’ Association), comes to mind.
No sooner had Minister Paul Calandra proposed his legislation to the Legislature regarding his approaches to correct the mechanisms designed to improve education and to target expenses to meeting the instructional needs of students, than the OECTA president asked – no… demanded – that the Minister revoke or cause the revocation of any school board’s decision not to fly the pride flag.
The Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board had decided that as a Board it would only fly the Canada flag and maybe the orange flag of truth and reconciliation. That was before the Board was placed under supervision. Teachers’ unions have no authority to interject themselves in either the operational side of the functioning of a board, or, as in the case of Catholic schools, with the denominational powers of its Trustees. Those Trustees answer to the magisterium (the Cardinal, in the diocese of Toronto) on such matters. It is he who ex cathedra makes the determination of what constitutes Catholicism and denominational rights.
He ultimately defines “what Catholicism” covers in the delivery of funds whose levy is authorized under the constitution to meet the sectoral rights of His Majesty’s Catholic subjects – parents of children in the schools. Minister Calandra responded publicly that he and his government have accepted this division of authority. OECTA, as an organization, might try to understand the concept.
