Religious lifestyles for Catholic teachers necessary, trustees say
EDMONTON Alberta Catholic schools need to hire Catholic teachers to retain their identity, says an association representing the school boards.
“It concerns us greatly to think that people feel unsafe, or felt bullied in their schools,” Alberta Catholic School Trustees’ Association (ACSTA) president Serena Shaw said on Monday, referring to news stories about LGBTQ teachers feeling unsure their employment is secure because of their sexual orientation.
The coverage prompted Education Minister David Eggen in December to request copies of all school boards’ employment agreements for review. Public school boards, which operate some religious schools, are included in the review.
Shaw said she hopes the practice of asking Catholic teachers to sign Catholicity agreements as a condition of their employment can continue. Teachers signed the agreements willingly, knowing what was expected of them, she said.
“The courts have told us that we have to be Catholic or there’s no reason for us to exist,” Shaw said. “And this is one of many ways that we are Catholic. We expect people to live Catholic lifestyles. We don’t have any intention of waiving that, as far as we’re concerned.”
Meanwhile, a group of Alberta public school boards has written to Eggen to say the religious requirements are discriminatory and should stop.
“We would encourage the Government of Alberta to take a principled stand to defend the legal rights of all its students and all employees,” Public School Boards’ Association of Alberta president Cathy Hogg said in a Dec. 19 letter.
Some clauses in employment agreements that require them to live a “Catholic lifestyle” were created by the Alberta Catholic School Trustees’ Association in 2009, trustees’ association executive director Dean Sarnecki said Monday.
All 17 Alberta Catholic boards agreed to include clauses in their employment contracts asking teachers to “follow, both in and out of school, a lifestyle and deportment in harmony with Catholic church practices and beliefs.”
Although Sarnecki said Monday the Alberta Teachers’ Association agreed to those clauses in 2009, association spokesman Jonathan Teghtmeyer refuted this. On Monday, Teghtmeyer said the teachers’ association wrote to all Catholic school boards in the 2009-10 school year, saying they disagreed with the language used.
Some school boards may have added more specific requirements, as is their prerogative, Shaw said.
The constitution and court decisions have upheld the right of Catholic schools to preferentially hire Catholics, Shaw said.
“As a Catholic, you’re not a Catholic for eight hours a day. You’re a Catholic all the time.”
Some teachers told Postmedia they signed the agreements before they came out as LGBTQ or because they needed a job.
Are Catholic teachers required to avoid birth control and fertility treatments, refrain from acting upon same-sex attraction and get married before becoming pregnant?
The shared Catholicity clause isn’t that specific, and Shaw wouldn’t be, either. She said it does make recruitment of Catholic teachers a challenge. “It’s a very high bar, that’s for sure.”
The public school boards’ association says it’s a standard no employee should be required to meet.
“I’ve never heard of any other employers who are allowed to ask the same questions of people and put the same demands on people,” president Hogg said in an interview Friday. “I think if there were, there’d be human rights violations cases left and right.”
Barb Hamilton, a Calgary Catholic school principal currently on leave, filed a human rights complaint against that district last year, alleging discrimination based on her sexual orientation.
Hogg said in her letter to Eggen that relying on employees to fight the issue in tribunals and courts “puts an individual in a terrible and untenable position.”
In a Friday email, Eggen’s spokesman, John Archer, said it is not acceptable to deny or terminate someone’s employment based on their sexuality. Eggen has directed the ministry of education to study what policies school authorities have in place and how conditions of employment are applied and practised, Archer said.